


a prayer for which no words exist

by natsubaki



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alpha Katsuki Yuuri, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Actors, Alternate Universe - Noir, Alternate Universe - Prohibition Era, Angst, Character Death, Correspondence, Domestic Bliss, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff, Gen, Hand Jobs, Hate Sex, Holidays, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Kissing, M/M, Murder Mystery, Murder-Suicide, Mutual Pining, Omega Verse, Omega Victor Nikiforov, Oral Sex, Organized Crime, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pampering, Psychology, Reincarnation, Reunions, Shaving, Speculation, Strangulation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2019-03-14
Packaged: 2019-08-10 23:34:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 32,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natsubaki/pseuds/natsubaki
Summary: What could be, what comes to pass, and what shall never be: noir-style. Based onBut Monsters Are Always Hungry, DarlingbyOrchids_and_Fictional_Citiesandiruutciv.An ongoing collection of fic(let)s—speculative, headcanons, and AUs—originally posted to Discord.[See chapter 1 for table of contents]





	1. Table of Contents

**Author's Note:**

  * For [iruutciv](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iruutciv/gifts), [Orchids_and_Fictional_Cities](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Orchids_and_Fictional_Cities/gifts).
  * Inspired by [But Monsters Are Always Hungry, Darling](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13105341) by [iruutciv](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iruutciv/pseuds/iruutciv), [Orchids_and_Fictional_Cities](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Orchids_and_Fictional_Cities/pseuds/Orchids_and_Fictional_Cities). 



> Orchids and Iru are wonderful enablers LOL. These are a series of ficlets written for and inspired by the BMAAHD Discord, based on speculations, headcanons, and AUs of AUs for the story. If you haven't yet read ["But Monsters Are Always Hungry, Darling,"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13105341/) _what are you waiting for?_ As such, **please heed the warnings on the original fic**. I'll be posting new ones as I write ~~, but there are some I've written I don't yet have clearance to post here~~. In keeping with the BMAAHD theme, the title comes from "You Are Jeff," a poem by Richard Siken.
> 
> Standard disclaimer: beware of spoilers! Also, most of these are written around pure speculation, so they might not entirely (or at all) fit in with BMAAHD's canon. ~~I'm just having fun lol.~~
> 
> A mountain of gratitude goes out to Orchids and Iru, for creating such a beautiful story and allowing us to play in their gorgeous and heartbreaking AU. <333

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a bit of organizational clean-up!

### In-Verse Stories

  * [Chapter 3: Victor's long hair](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38585600) (rating: T, Victor)
  * [Chapter 4: Caught in a rainstorm](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38585792) (rating: G, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 5: Hate sex](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38585924) (rating: M, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 6: Adoption](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38587193) (rating: T, Minako and young Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 7: A favor](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38945360) (rating: G, Yakov and Lilia)
  * [Chapter 8: Library romp](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38945558) (rating: E, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 10: Thanksgiving at the beach house](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/39312013) (rating: G, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 11: Last call at Casa Roja](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/39803385) (rating: T, Christophe)
  * [Chapter 15: Fixing up the beach house](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40385486) (rating: G, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 16: A night of pampering](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40511996) (rating: E, Yuuri/Victor)
  * [Chapter 18: The evening at Kips Bay](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40813442) (rating: M, Victor)
  * [Chapter 19: To leave or to stay](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/41212562) (rating: T, Victor/Yuuri)



### Ending/Post-Canon AU^AU Stories

  * [Chapter 23: Post-story ice skating](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/42815285) (rating: G, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 24: Postcards](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/42815339) (rating: G, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 25: Post-story reunion](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/42815390) (rating: G, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 21: An ending](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/42790430) (rating: M, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 22: An ending - alternate](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/42790535) (rating: T, Victor/Yuuri)



### General AU^AUs

  * [Chapter 2: Victor’s daughter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/38558711) (rating: M, Victor)



### Omegaverse AU^AU

  * [Chapter 9: First meeting [chapter 1]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/39096991) (rating: M, Yuuri/Victor)
  * [Chapter 17: Therapy and a date [chapters 2-3]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40648283) (rating: M, Yuuri/Victor)
  * [Chapter 20: Therapy and a mistake [chapters 4-5]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/41685383) (rating: M, Yuuri/Victor)



### Actors AU^AU

  * [Chapter 12: First meeting](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40051561) (rating: T, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 13: First scene [chapter 1]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40051650) (rating: T, Victor/Yuuri)
  * [Chapter 14: The auction [chapter 11]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16464446/chapters/40275236) (rating: T, Victor/Yuuri)




	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She has Sara’s hair and skin the color of tea mixed with cream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 16 October 2018; based on [Orchids's AU^AU](https://orchids-and-fictional-cities.tumblr.com/post/177461694142/for-that-ask-thing-bmaahd-4-and-9)

She has Sara’s hair and skin the color of tea mixed with cream. She’s only a few days old, her features far from settling, but her eyes are blue, and Victor wonders if they’ll keep, if any part of him will live on in his daughter.

It aches to look at her, to feel her tiny fingers clasp around his. To see her short breaths and hear her strong cries and know he condemned her to this life. Sara rarely comes by the nursery except for feeding times, but Victor all but lives here now, when he hasn’t been summoned for other...duties. Each time he returns, exhausted and carrying a little less of himself, he looks into the crib and refuses to think _beautiful_ , because that’s a curse he wishes will end with him.

 _Beautiful_ collects empty promises and invites sweet words that sound more befitting in an elegy. _Beautiful_ attracts attention. _Beautiful_ is a seduction that only renders despair.

So Victor simply stays and watches when no one else does, murmurs his devotion with kisses to her cheeks, and cradles her against his chest when she sleeps and he finds himself dreaming of fire once again. He shields her from the maids’ whisperings and the Don’s musings, bartering his body and his own empty words as distraction. She is the bullet loaded into the chamber of the gun pointed at his head, and Victor knows he never had a chance at winning or negotiating.

That talent had died along with the others who’d perished that day.

He may not be meant for this world for long, and maybe he’ll be dead long before any memories plant the seeds of rot in her life. Maybe it’ll be better that way, gone without leaving the wreckage of his footprints upon anyone’s heart. A small gift he can give, since he bears nothing else of value but his absence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I almost titled this collection "the things we invent when we are scared and want to be rescued," also a line from a Siken poem. _Almost._ XD


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victor wonders what his mother sees when she looks at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 19 October 2018

Victor wonders what his mother sees when she looks at him: his hair is hers, silver and fine, but her eyes are the lightest shade of hazel, brown and green and laced with yellow, like two sunflowers blooming from her face. Victor’s own eyes are blue, a relic from a father he’s never known, as blue as the ocean that separates them. Sitting on the docks by his house, the salt like tears in his lungs, Victor stares into the horizon and calculates the distance the sun has yet to travel until it’s swallowed by the sea. 

Until she returns home.

One day, Victor waits. And waits. And the clock ticks, and night falls, and another night passes with cold and hunger but the door never opens. No one comes home, and on the third day, home has lost its meaning.

When Victor looks into the mirror, he begins to see a ghost from his past. He grows his hair out, just like hers had been, to keep the ghost tethered to his side. When it gets long enough, Lilia starts to braid it for him, and that becomes their daily ritual. But Lilia isn’t Mama, and soon enough, she’s gone, too.

Georgi’s sisters take over the duties, eager to flex their small fingers around the thick rope of his hair. They _ooh_ and _ahh_ over how pretty it is, how pretty it makes him look. _“Gosha, don’t you agree?” they remark, “Our Vitya’s as pretty as a girl.”_ Victor never learns, and so the day he moves out as his own act of charity marks the beginning of his standard style: a simple ponytail.

There are whispers. Victor has an idea what they’re saying: it doesn’t take a genius to deduce a systematic case of exchanging _favors_ in the workforce. But he keeps it, despite the lies and insults and humiliation, because he has no one at home waiting for him except a dog, so he might as well keep his illusion alive.

Victor starts to avoid looking at his reflection the morning after he’d sold a portion of himself to the devil. The image of her has begun to fade around the edges, blurry and distorted. All he sees now are the ghost of hands upon his skin and raking through his hair. The stench of lit cigars and the heady taste of musk fill the cracks, _“That was fun”_ ringing sharp in his ears from a smile like a scimitar cutting across rough lips. 

His scalp itches. His silver hair— _“Like silk,” he’d said, “I don’t think even my Sara’s is as beautiful”_ —falls heavy about his shoulders. It looks like a funeral veil. If he had ever learned to braid, he could have twisted himself a noose.

Six months after the world ends, Victor stares into the mirror and does not see his mother anymore.

He raises the shears.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Shit, it’s really coming down,” Victor says as he reaches into his coat pocket, pulling out a small rolled-up umbrella.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 20 October 2018

“Shit, it’s really coming down,” Victor says as he reaches into his coat pocket, pulling out a small rolled-up umbrella.

Yuuri squints accusingly at the sky. Rain cascades down the awning of the coffee shop, falling in thick, sparkling curtains. He shuffles his briefcase in his hands, unlatching the flap and nearly losing a fountain pen in the process. He has file folders, notebooks, his glasses case...and no umbrella.

“Forget yours?” Victor peers over, a tiny frown tugging down the left corner of his mouth as he watches Yuuri search through his bag. “We can always share mine. I don’t mind.”

Yuuri hesitates, his sight shifting from the black umbrella perched over Victor’s silver hair to the clusters of passerby in the street. He’s four years old again, the perpetual mist of Seattle a steady film over his skin. His father is unfurling a forest green umbrella, his mother laughing as they link arms and she pulls herself close to his side. _“Anata,” she’d say, “it’s barely raining. We don’t really need this.”_ But her words are wrapped in affection as she leans her head against his shoulder, his father chuckling in return. They set off, their footsteps in sync, and together they look like the structure of a house, the umbrella a little roof shielding them from the drizzle.

“Is something wrong?” Victor says, his voice hesitant and lips now fully forming a frown. He holds out the handle toward Yuuri, his eyes wide. “You can take it, we don’t have to share,” he begins, “I can turn my jacket collar up—your clothes are so much nicer, and the leather of your briefcase, too- I‘ll just get it back the next time we see each other.”

“Victor,” Yuuri says.

“Yes?” Victor blinks. It’s always so cute when he can catch the detective by surprise.

Yuuri loops his hand into the crook of Victor’s elbow, the leather of his glove sliding effortlessly across the tweed. Victor is a calming warmth against the chill of the storm. Yuuri smiles, his chest painfully tight at the soft blush blossoming upon Victor’s face. The color is nostalgic, somehow.

“Let’s go.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They bask in the afterglow, chests still heaving, bodies still intimately connected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 24 October 2018

They bask in the afterglow, chests still heaving, bodies still intimately connected. It had been all teeth and rough pulling, a viciousness consuming any of the gentleness they once had shared.

Yuuri moves and Victor on reflex follows, gun resting firmly in his grip and aimed between Yuuri’s eyes. He cocks the hammer, the satisfying _click_ stirring something dark inside him.

“That gun is more of a danger to you than it is on me, Detective,” Yuuri taunts, the words pulling his lips into a sharp smirk. Victor is well-aware of the knife tip pressing against the center of his chest. Yuuri drags it along Victor’s skin, leaving a wake of tiny red blossoms, before settling it just to the left over Victor’s heart. “You never did seem keen on following any of your doctor’s orders.”

“Maybe if you’d been a bit more _professional_ in your approach, I’d have listened more.”

A harsh bark of laughter erupts from Yuuri’s mouth. His smile widens, his eyes burning coal. “Darling, we both know you never saw me as anything close to that.”

_He’s right,_ Victor’s traitorous mind supplies, _you never stood a chance. If only we hadn’t met that night._ The thought slices into him, no different than if Yuuri’s hand were to run his knife clean through him. Yuuri’s eyes bore into him, unblinking. Victor raises his free hand, ever so slowly, and closes it over Yuuri’s wrist. His bones are so delicate—were Victor to grip tighter, surely he could snap them like dried twigs.

Yuuri does not move.

Victor slides his hand up, brushing along Yuuri’s arm and pausing at his neck. There are faint marks there that he traces—they will surely darken within a few hours, a souvenir from this encounter. It pleases Victor more than he’d care to admit, but whether that’s from possessiveness or from an ugly desire to harm the man in front of him, Victor does not know, nor does he care to find out. _We almost match._ He quickly shoves that thought aside. Victor moves his hold to catch lightly over the side of Yuuri’s face. His fingers comb into the dark hair of their own accord, thumb stroking carefully over Yuuri’s cheek. Like this, he could easily slide his hand to the back of Yuuri’s head, press the muzzle of his gun harder into Yuuri’s forehead.

Instead, Victor simply enjoys the feel of Yuuri under him, of the softness that does not steep into his personality and the beauty he wields like a silent weapon. There’s a line forming between Yuuri’s eyebrows, his brown eyes shifting ever so slightly, the brilliance in his mind no doubt parsing the evidence pouring from Victor’s still-open wound. He grits his teeth; he’s never liked the feeling of being placed under a microscope. And yet here he is.

Something in Yuuri finally falters, and he looks away, breaking the moment. He pushes off Victor brusquely and smoothes through his hair, as if to erase Victor’s touch. Victor shakily rises to his feet and begins buttoning his shirt. It takes a few seconds for his fingers to work correctly, before he can properly line up the holes and cover himself. The cut Yuuri had made is shallow and has already scabbed over, so at least there’s no suspicious-looking stain to drive up his next dry cleaning bill. He tucks his shirt tails in and replaces his revolver back into its holster, then shrugs his jacket over, concealing it all. By the time he’s finished pulling himself back together, Yuuri is already dressed, as though their little tryst had never happened at all.

“Don’t come here again,” Yuuri says, briefcase clutched in his grasp. With his expensive clothing, fancy watch, glasses perched upon his nose and impassive mask plastered onto his face, he looks every inch of the doctor his medical license grants him. “I might really kill you next time.”

Yuuri turns and walks away— _again_ —as he is wont to do. It really shouldn’t hurt as much as it does. 

Victor does not say, _Maybe that’s the treatment that will cure me._


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s way out of her comfort zone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 26 October 2018

She’s way out of her comfort zone. The child sits curled up on himself in the corner, shivering like a leaf in a hailstorm. Every time she tries to address him, he pulls himself tighter, locking her out.

Minako sighs, not trying to hide her frustration. He’s just a kid, she knows, but she’s never pegged herself as the motherly type. There’s a reason why she declined any and all proposals and _omiai._ She’s not cut out for this shit.

“Hey,” she says, pulling a canister down and setting a heavy kettle upon the stove. The boy flinches as the gas catches and ignites. “You like tea?”

Silence. Okay then.

She hadn’t expected this to be...easy. Aside from having lost his family...Minako’s seen the scars. The child tries to hide them as best he can—tugs his shirtsleeves past his wrists, kneels rather than bends. She doesn’t know the whole story, but it’s not hard to parse what likely happened. It’s every sad story in every orphanage: neglect, abuse, cruelty. Kindness is a rare commodity.

The kettle whistles angrily, snapping her out of her thoughts. Minako clicks the burner off and pours the water into a teapot, years of experience her measurement. A few minutes later and the water is a pale ochre, fragrant and steaming.

Setting a cup upon the floor next to the boy, Minako leans back against the kitchen countertop and watches. She plucks a cigarette from her pack, purses it between her lips, and strikes a match, quickly waving it out once the tip of the cigarette has been lit. The boy flinches again, a visible tremble overtaking his body.

_Shit._

“It’s _genmaicha_ ,” she tries, exhaling smoke through her nose. “It’s sweeter than normal tea. Try it.”

Brown eyes peek over crossed arms. A spiderweb cracks up his glasses; she’ll have to remember to take him to a doctor soon to get that fixed. One hand snakes down, fingertips testing the temperature of the porcelain. Hesitantly, the boy picks up the cup and stares down into it, his glasses fogging. Minako bites back a snort.

“It’s good.” The voice is weak, watery.

“I’m glad. There’s plenty more.”

An easier silence follows.

Minako blows through a second cigarette before he speaks again. “You- you didn’t have to.”

She mentally sighs this time; she’s not playing this game. “I know. But I did, so now here we both are. Get used to it.”

He won’t look at her. That’s okay. But he’s worrying at his lip, and Minako isn’t entirely sure he won’t bite right through it. “You know about dragons?”

The question throws him. His little eyebrows form the sign of a mountain. It’s...pretty damn cute. Minako gestures to the print on her kimono. “ _Kaa-san_ told me about one. _Seiryuu_ is one of the four gods and brings spring.”

“Very good,” Minako says. “And the south?”

“ _Suzaku_ ,” he answers. “It’s a...fire bird?”

“Yes, a phoenix,” Minako corrects. “Did your _kaa-san_ tell you what they can do?”

The child shakes his head.

“At the end of its life, it sets itself on fire”—a short gasp—“but from its ashes, a new phoenix is born.” Minako stoops low, getting as eye-to-eye with the child as she can without sitting on the floor. She takes his tiny hand in hers, then drags back his sleeve before he can do anything about it. Minako frowns, her touch light even as the boy squirms.

“Stop-” he cries, already trying to pull his arm from her grasp. But Minako lets him go, only to grab him and give him a little shake.

“Listen to me, Yuuri,” she says, her fingers too tight upon his slight shoulders. The collar of his shirt stretches, revealing an angry burn just below the nape. “I know it’s hard, but do not let this fire consume you. You can be a dragon, and let it be your weapon. Or you can be a phoenix, and let it reforge you. But you must choose: will you use it to destroy, or will you be reborn?”

Yuuri finally meets her gaze. He’s holding back tears, his eyes puffy and rimmed with red. An inferno rages behind them. “I will help you. But the choice is yours. So think about it.”

He nods, the fight draining from him. He’s still so young. Minako offers a small smile and presses the teacup back into his hands. “Finish that. Are you hungry?”

A shake of the head. She knows it’s a lie, but she’ll let it slide for now.

“Okay. We’ll go shopping later. You can pick out your clothes. Does that sound okay?”

An almost indecipherable nod.

“Yuuri, this place will be your home from now on. If there is anything you need, just let me know.”

Minako’s not entirely sure why she’s done this. She wasn’t particularly close with Hiroko or Toshiya, but once she’d discovered their son had ended up orphaned with no place left to go, she couldn’t just do nothing. They would never rest well if she’d knowingly turned a blind eye. And Yuuri...Minako knows there’s no such thing as _fair_ , but what he’s had to endure, at such a young age… She may be hardened, but she is not _heartless._

Minako had left Kyuushuu long ago, but it would always be her true home. And in this foreign city that eagerly devours the innocent and naive, Minako refuses to let one more of her countrymen fall victim to its jaws.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I can’t say this is unwelcomed, but it’s certainly unexpected,” Yakov says, leaning back in his chair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 9 November 2018

“I can’t say this is unwelcomed, but it’s certainly unexpected,” Yakov says, leaning back in his chair. He laces his fingers together over his stomach, sliding them over slowly in an attempt to smooth the creases in his vest and hoping it goes unnoticed. It’s been years since they parted, but Yakov still bears more of a torch for the woman in front of him than he’ll ever care to admit.

Not that it matters, though. She always has a way of knowing.

Lilia Baranovskaya sits across from him in his office, looking just as striking as the day they first met. She perches at the edge of the seat, back ramrod straight, gaze boring into him. She’s always carried herself with a certain sternness and pride, had even refused to take his last name like the American way, and Yakov had loved her for it.

She says nothing; she doesn’t _have_ to. They both know the reason she’s here. Yakov sighs, taking off his hat and dragging a palm down his face. Better to get this over with. _Madame_ Baranovskaya is safer on his heart in small doses. “Why does this matter so much to you?”

“That needn’t be of your concern,” she replies frostily. “But if you must ask, his mother is one of mine.”

Great. Just great. So who knew what world of depravity the child had already been subject to. “I don’t do charity cases,” he says, more gruffly than intended.

She sits a little higher, a little straighter, if humanly possible. “This is not a charity case. He will be working for you, will he not?”

“Yes, but,” Yakov says, and hadn’t that always been how it was? _Yes, but._ “It will take time to train him, to get him to give a damn. If he’s already a delinquent now, he won’t want to be here.”

Excuses, all of them. He _knows_.

“Yakov Vasilievich Feltsman,” she says, the groove between her arched brows a deep cut upon her high forehead, “will you help the boy or not?”

“We both know how well the last time I took someone in ended up,” Yakov finally says, slumping in his seat and wishing dreadfully for the vodka stored in his bottom drawer.

Lilia raises an elegant brow. “Yes. He’s become the crown jewel of your agency.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yakov. This is different.” Her voice is uncharacteristically soft. She means, _this time will be different_. “He lives with his grandparents. He is a bright boy, but lacks discipline and refinement. I have every belief you can provide the guidance he needs.”

It _is_ different. Vitya was a lonely child whose every action screamed for acceptance. It had driven him far, and away, and into a myriad of dark places. Yakov still hasn’t forgiven himself for that.

“If you are concerned about money, then I will pay,” she offers, after a moment of tense silence.

“I don’t need your money.” God knows where it might have come from or for what purpose. Yakov works hand-in-hand with the NYPD. He has to at least _try_ to operate a clean shop.

He takes a deep breath and exhales loudly through his nose. Lilia waits, patient and watching as ever. Once upon a time, they had been perfect for each other. “I’ll do it, granted one thing.”

“And that is?” Yakov thinks he can hear amusement in her voice. He should have headed home half an hour ago.

Yakov looks at her, his chest uncomfortably tight. Oh, but she is still a vision. “Dinner. With me. Next Sunday night.”

She laughs, and Yakov is still unaccustomed to hearing it, even after years of marriage. “I will host,” she replies as she stands and straightens her long skirt. “Next Sunday. Eight o’clock sharp. I do not accept tardiness.”

“But Lilia,” Yakov sputters, losing whatever flimsy control he had over the situation, and stands, too. “Where–”

Lilia steps closer, her heels clicking on the hardwoods. Leans down and tilts his chin up with a single gloved finger. Her lips turn upward and press lightly against his cheek. The scent of roses blossom in Yakov’s nose. She turns and leaves with no other preamble.

“You’ve always known where to find me.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is his first time in the room, technically speaking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 11 November 2018. Inspired by an illustration Iru drew of Yuuri in his library - this one gets the Explicit rating!

It is his first time in the room, _technically_ speaking. Victor doesn’t count the quick peek he had snuck the first time he had found himself in Yuuri’s home, and this time, Victor had been invited in. Across the way, Yuuri pours two drinks at his serving cart as Victor takes in the room around him. Floor to ceiling bookshelves line the walls, neatly stacked with canvas and leather-bound texts and a miscellany of odds and ends. Victor runs his fingers across the top of them, following the hills and valleys of their height.

“For you,” Yuuri says as he offers one of the glasses in his hands. The whiskey is a deep amber, a single large ice cube drifting within.

“To us,” Victor replies, raising the glass and clinking it lightly against Yuuri’s. Victor sniffs it before downing a mouthful; it’s as mellow and sweet as its aroma. But not nearly as sweet as the slight smile that spreads across Yuuri’s lips.

“So you’ve read all these?” Victor gestures to the neatly-arranged rows. There must be hundreds lined up.

Yuuri nods as he takes his own sip. “Over the years. Mostly for my studies, but some for recreation.”

Victor murmurs in assent. He’d read a lot as a child, escaping into the fantasies books contained. But as the years passed and he grew older, reading for entertainment dwindled as he’d thrown himself into work. Yuuri, it seems, does not share that problem. Victor selects one at random: it’s a bit more worn at the edges than the rest of them.

Yuuri peers over his shoulder as Victor plucks it from the shelf, a soft thudding following as the book next to it tilts in its absence. “ _Psychology of the Unconscious_ ,” Yuuri says, as if answering an unasked question, “it’s a cornerstone work of scholarship for my practice.”

Victor nods as he idly flips through the book. It’s all rambling analyses and jargon, and he can’t help but imagine a younger Yuuri sitting at his desk late at night, poring over the words, perhaps the end of a pen stuck between his teeth. He smiles, closing the book with a snap, and presses it to Yuuri’s chest. “Read to me,” he says, his mouth pulling into a smirk before he can stop it. His hands hover there until Yuuri’s own lift to take hold of the book, his expression a little unreadable behind the frames of his glasses.

Yuuri sets his glass aside and then swipes his palm over the cover, rubbing at the embossed letters. He carefully opens the book, skipping ahead, his cheeks briefly darkening, before he pages back to the beginning. Clearing his throat, Yuuri repositions the book at eye-level. “Chapter one. Concerning the two kinds of thinking.”

He’s always loved the sound of Yuuri’s voice, even when infuriating words tumble from it. He could listen to it all day, in any language, and wrap himself in contentment. Victor takes another sip of the whiskey, rolling it around on his tongue, before his glass joins Yuuri’s. He has other plans for the night.

“It is a well-known fact that one of the principles of analytic psychology is that the dream images are to be understood symbolically,” Yuuri continues in a steady timbre. “That is to say, that they are not to be taken literally just as they are presented in sleep, but that behind them a hidden meaning has to be surmised.”

Victor stays at a distance, allowing the words to wash over him, not really paying attention to their meaning but of the way they lilt and blend. Yuuri’s gaze is focused upon the pages, his recitation uninterrupted even as he retrieves his drink. “That dreams may be full of import, and, therefore, something to be interpreted, is certainly neither a strange nor an extraordinary idea. This has been familiar to mankind for thousands of years, and, therefore, seems much like a banal truth.”

When Yuuri appears absorbed enough in his task, Victor circles closer. His hands fall to Yuuri’s hips, and he leans in, careful of the book, to mouth at the juncture of Yuuri’s neck. Yuuri shifts beneath him, laughing as he backs up against the shelves. “Victor, are you even listening?”

“Of course.” It’s not _technically_ a lie; he _is_ listening. Very intently, at that. Yuuri raises an eyebrow but resumes, squirming on occasion but persisting in fortitude.

Victor rakes his fingers down Yuuri’s shirt, pulling the tails out and reaching down to grasp at the meat of Yuuri’s ass. Yuuri’s breath hitches, his hips canting forward, but he continues reading, and Victor sinks to his knees. He waits until he captures Yuuri’s gaze then drags the zipper of his trousers down with his teeth. To his delight, Yuuri is already half-hard, and Victor nuzzles at the clothed bulge before tugging the elastic of Yuuri’s underwear low. Victor wraps his hand around the length and gives it a lazy pump.

It’s not the first time they’ve done this, but it’s the first time Victor is on his knees for Yuuri, and he _wants_ this. Yuuri is staring down intently at him, his pupils dark shadows in the dark of the room. “Well?” Victor teases, “Go on.”

Yuuri swallows, his adam’s apple bobbing with the effort. Victor sweeps his bangs aside and opens his mouth, taking Yuuri in.

“From countless inscribed monuments of all times–” A short pause. “–and peoples we learn of foreboding dreams,” Yuuri gasps as Victor drags the flat of his tongue against the underside of Yuuri’s cock, “of significant–” He takes a breath; Victor stills until the stream of words restarts. “–of prophetic and also of curative dreams which the Deity sent to the sick, sleeping in the temple.”

Victor works into a rhythm, sliding his lips back and forth, sometimes burying his face against Yuuri’s groin, sometimes working his tongue just around the tip of him. He loses himself to the motions as Yuuri continues to read aloud. Victor concentrates on the heat and weight on his tongue, mapping out the ridges and veins. The tang and salt of Yuuri’s skin. The way Yuuri’s cock twitches whenever Victor faintly grazes his teeth over it.

And Yuuri dutifully continues. “From our experience, it is hardly conceivable that a God existing outside of ourselves causes dreams, or that the dream–” He curses as his eyes meet Victor’s, the flush spreading high on his cheekbones. Victor looks up at him through his eyelashes and _sucks_ , and Yuuri groans, the book dropping to the floor and quickly forgotten as he leans back heavily against the shelves, his thighs quivering. His hands find Victor’s head and thread into his hair. They linger there, neither pulling nor pushing, allowing Victor to work at his leisure.

Yuuri begins to mutter underneath his breath, sounds that Victor does not recognize but seem almost musical. He wants to hear more. Victor quickens his pace, moving one hand to work in time with his mouth and gently knead Yuuri’s balls with the other.

Finally he feels the tugging, Yuuri’s breath hitching sharply. “Victor, I–” But Victor clutches onto Yuuri’s hips more tightly, feeling the fine fabric wrinkle in his grasp, as he swallows Yuuri’s length deeper. Yuuri’s hips stutter in an aborted thrust, and Victor looks up, wanting to watch as Yuuri becomes undone. The taste of his release is almost a secondary experience, Victor too caught up in the way Yuuri’s eyes fall shut, his eyelashes fluttering in pleasure, his teeth worrying at his bottom lip. He’s far too beautiful for words. Victor feels his own heart beat faster as Yuuri comes down, his breath evening back to normal.

He slides off Yuuri slowly, giving the head a last suckle as he sits back on his haunches, the aching in his knees eventually making itself known. His own head is buzzing, barely registering when Yuuri pulls him back up to standing and crushes his lips against Victor’s. The kiss is fierce and full of fire, and Victor falls easily into it, his eyes closing as he allows Yuuri to slip his tongue alongside his. Victor wonders what Yuuri must think (or Jung, for that matter), being able to taste himself on Victor, and the idea curls warmly within his gut. And then the kiss gentles, soft yet still insistent, Yuuri’s arms wrapping around Victor’s shoulders.

When they break apart, Yuuri rests his forehead against Victor’s. It’s slightly damp, a few tendrils of hair having escaped from their styling. Yuuri laughs, bright and wonderful. Victor wants to bottle it up and store it inside his heart.

Victor can’t help but return the smile. “Dream about that tonight.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translation of Jung by Beatrice Hinkle.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The moment his foot crosses the threshold of the entrance, Yuuri is helplessly drawn in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 16 November 2018. Omegaverse AU^AU! All of the dialogue, of course, is gifted from Orchids's original (Chapter 1)~

The moment his foot crosses the threshold of the entrance, Yuuri is helplessly drawn in. The scent hits him like a freight train, cutting through the heady smell of smoke and booze, and pulls like a tether around his neck. Yuuri hesitates at the doorway, heel poised to pivot, but then he decides _to hell with it_. He’s already had a piss-poor day, and he might as well add some more bad decisions to top it off. Who knows, the man whose scent calls to him may spare them both by mercifully ignoring Yuuri. Certainly, whoever this stranger is, he must get enough unwanted attention, or he may even be already bonded. 

Weaving through the scattering of low tables and groups of patrons, Yuuri slides himself onto the nearest free barstool, which happens to be directly next to the stranger. This close up, the strength of the scent is practically _scandalous_. He appears to be alone and is _leaking_ pheromones; Yuuri nearly scrunches his nose at the thought of this stranger’s partner letting him out of their sight in such a state. 

He takes a breath and holds it after giving his order to the bartender, allowing the scent to collect in his nose and lungs. It’s a strange and intoxicating blend of frost and burnt tobacco, a deep edge of darkly-roasted coffee, with a high sweet note that rises to the top. Oddly, Yuuri recalls the sensation of crisp wind blowing through drying tree leaves and salt crashing upon beaches. He’s never encountered a scent so complex and beguiling in his life.

With not an insignificant amount of pride, Yuuri notices the spike in his seatmate’s interest, and he inwardly preens. Yuuri knows he’s not much to look at, but he’s been trained well to attract the eye, and that seems to be working. He’s not the only one here doing the looking tonight. 

It’s a small and annoying disturbance, but Yuuri’s almost grateful as it provides an opportunity to speak with this alluring stranger. “Something you’d like to share?” Yuuri says with narrowed eyes, watching as the man nearly asphyxiates into his drink with laughter.

“That depends. Are you going to eviscerate me with your tongue like you did to him?” he says, amusement coating his voice.

“I could eviscerate you with something else,” Yuuri counters, the events of the day briefly catching up with him again. But then Yuuri pauses, the man having turned toward him finally, and runs his gaze over him with intent. The stranger looks as enticing as he smells: striking blue eyes framed by delicate long lashes; shiny, pale hair, the color of which Yuuri can’t quite determine in the low light of the bar; a long and lean frame hidden under a poorly-fitted suit. He resists licking his lips. “Or, I could do other things to you with my tongue, if you prefer.”

The stranger blinks, and Yuuri fears he might have pushed too far too fast, but then the stranger toys at the lip of his glass in contemplation. “Normally I would ask you to buy me a drink first. But I already have one.”

Ah. A rejection, then. Par for the course for his day. “And what great misfortune that is.”

His eyes widen as the man takes hold of his drink and knocks it back in one gulp. 

Or maybe not.

A smile carves across Yuuri’s lips as he calls for the bartender.

It’s easy to fall into pleasantries with the man, and although something seems to be weighing on him, Yuuri does not press. He had come here for an escape, a brief reprieve from reality. He does not want to play doctor on his off hours.

But he’s never _truly_ off, is he? Yuuri frowns as he downs the last mouthful of his drink, the sting of citrus and brandy hitting the back of his throat. “I need to make a phone call. You wouldn’t mind saving this seat for me, would you?” Yuuri says, already standing and removing his jacket. The stranger appears a little taken aback by his abruptness, but Yuuri doesn’t give him a chance to answer before he strides toward the far end of the bar. Every step feels like walking to the gallows.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been gone, and he’s already far too gone to care. It was just one tiny hit. Yuuri’s life is spiraling quickly, and if he’s on his way to the grave, he might as well _dance_ to it. 

The bar is thick with patrons when he returns, the lights lowered and moody jazz in the air. Yuuri pushes through the crowds, finding his way back by his nose alone. God, that man’s scent is like a beacon, and like a ship he crashes ashore. “Heyyy you…” he slurs, so very close yet not close enough.

“Welcome back,” the stranger chuckles, and _god_ , does that sound nice coming out of those lips. 

Yuuri’s heart clenches, but before he has time to get emotional over a _greeting_ , he throws a pile of bills onto the countertop and tugs at the man with a giggle. “Come on, I want to show you something.”

Yuuri pulls at him like he’s dragging the tail of the noose around his neck. He shoves the man into the phone booth he’d just been occupying, and when the man hits the back of it with a gasp, Yuuri capitalizes on the opportunity and crushes their lips together, sliding his tongue in to taste.

And _fuck_. He tastes as sweet as he smells, and like this, in this tiny room and pressed together, the sensations are overwhelming. Yuuri’s mind is already firing at several miles per minute, and his body is alight, blood rushing in his veins. He blows past the stranger’s stupid concerns—why _wouldn’t_ he want this?—silencing him as his mouth roams and his hands work to peel away the man’s garments. Yuuri tugs at the man’s tie, breathing in the heady scent at his neck, raking teeth across the gland and making the stranger shudder beneath him. Yuuri smiles, pleased, but then he notices the shadows cast along the man’s skin don’t shift or fade, and he pulls back momentarily in silence. 

He’s not sure what to make of this, but Yuuri feels a surging in his gut, the alpha in him wishing to stand a bit taller, a bit broader, wanting to blanket this vulnerable and beautiful omega with his body. The marks circle around the man’s neck, but the most important one isn’t there. 

He’s unclaimed. 

Yuuri wants to make this omega his own.

Cupping the sides of his face, Yuuri stares at the man, and _god_ , it’s criminal, the things this man is doing to him. What _Yuuri_ would do for him in this moment, not even knowing his name. Yuuri kisses the man more gently this time, sensing an edge of distress souring his inviting scent. And finally, _finally_ , the stranger is touching him back, his long and slender fingers travelling up and down Yuuri’s sides and holding onto Yuuri delicately.

But Yuuri wants _more_ , wants to give this omega pleasure and carve it into his memory, wants to make him feel so good he’ll want to _submit_. Fumbling past the buttons, Yuuri slides a hand down the omega’s pants, and he keens so prettily. Face pressed into Yuuri’s neck, the omega bites back his moans and scents him so heavily that Yuuri is momentarily dizzy. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” he murmurs into the omega’s soft hair. “Just like that.” Yuuri moves his hand along the omega’s cock with sure motions and twists, encouraged by the gasps and stuttering of the man’s hips. Yuuri’s never been with someone so _responsive_ , and he wonders what other noises the man would make, if Yuuri’s cock was buried to the hilt inside him. 

“You’re stunning. _God_.”

The staccato banging on the door is like an ice bath dripping down his spine. Yuuri breaks away as if he’d been singed, quickly redressing and pressing no small amount of bills into the bartender’s hand. To the man’s credit, he appears genuinely apologetic to interrupt and more than a little amused, but now that the drug is starting to wear off, Yuuri realizes just how bad of an idea this all is.

He flees into the streets without looking behind him, smoothing his hair back into place. Yuuri doesn’t feel the cold just yet and is grateful for the crisp air, gulping down lungfuls of it to wash out the stranger’s scent. Yuuri just wants to live peacefully, uninterrupted. He shouldn’t get involved, much less with some random civilian, even if he’s the most beautiful person Yuuri’s ever met. Rummaging around in his jacket, Yuuri is thankful to find the pack of cigarettes still intact in his pocket and lights one up. The tobacco is calming and grounding, and Yuuri takes a long drag off it as he leans against the street lamp, considering the course of his evening.

Yuuri shouldn’t be surprised when the stranger fumbles outside after him. “Well? Where to now?” he says, suddenly eager.

He smirks in return. “Look who’s so keen all of a sudden.”

The man is a bit affronted at the words, and Yuuri bites back an outright laugh. “Maybe we’re going about this all wrong. Let’s start again,” the man says as he approaches. The snow underfoot is fresh and loud. “I’m Victor, by the way. And you are?” he introduces and holds out a hand.

Yuuri eyes it but makes no movement other than to pull another drag off his cigarette, exhaling the curling smoke into a screen between them. “Cold. Re-evaluating some of the choices that I made.”

“Well, how about that,” Vic– _no_ , the stranger laughs.

“Don’t give me that look,” Yuuri teases, because the man is almost pouting, and it’s _doing things_ to his resolve.

“What look?”

And now Yuuri almost pities the man. It’s really not his fault. “Like you’re wounded at the loss of something that wasn’t even promised.”

“I don’t have a lot of faith in promises,” comes the reply, and it’s too quick, like it’s practiced, or born from habit.

Yuuri hums a little under his breath. Another thing they have in common then, other than attraction. “That’s a wise policy.”

Pushing off the lamppost, Yuuri closes their distance with a lazy stroll. He takes the stranger by the back of his head and pulls him down so that their lips meet again. Even the cold and the smoke can’t mask the stranger’s scent, and Yuuri laments what could have been. He kisses the man slowly, pouring all the dying possibilities into it, leaving him with the memory while purging himself of it. There is no future meant for them, so this is all they will ever have.

When they part, Yuuri shoves the cigarette between the man’s lips for good measure. “Don’t follow me,” he warns as the stranger coughs around the smoke, “I’ve got a gun.” There is an art to distraction, and Yuuri has learned it well. 

Yuuri turns and disappears, knowing despite the lie, he won’t be followed. 

No one’s ever bothered to chase him, after all.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Despite having been born in the States, it’s the first time Yuuri has actually done anything of note to celebrate Thanksgiving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 25 November 2018. For the timeline, squint a little or pretend this is ~~optimistic~~ post-story shenanigans lol.

Despite having been born in the States, it’s the first time Yuuri has actually done anything of note to celebrate Thanksgiving. His own family had never bothered with the tradition, and after that...well, it’s not like Yuuri had much to be thankful for.

Until now.

The drive out to Long Island flies by, Makkachin snoozing in the back with their bags and sacks of groceries, Victor’s hand resting lightly above his on the shifter. It’s far more frigid out by the water, the beach icy as the waves crash in, but Yuuri would take this cold and isolation over the bustle of the city any day.

After helping to unpack their bags, Yuuri is shooed out of the kitchen despite his best protests. Victor walks him backwards until he falls into an armchair and then plops a pen and crossword puzzle book onto his lap. “Stay,” he commands, to Yuuri’s astonishment, and Makkachin ambles over to nap by his feet. Yuuri doesn’t need to be told twice. He divides his time between the pages of the puzzle book and watching Victor move about the kitchen, so comfortable at the stove and with the drawers full of utensils. 

Victor makes a literal feast, far too much food for them to hope to finish between the two of them. Makkachin would certainly be eating like a queen tonight.

With their small table laid out with platters and bowls of food, the flatware they picked out together awaiting heaps of meat and vegetables, Yuuri’s heart feels full. He watches the muscles in Victor’s forearms flex as he carves the turkey, his shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows and dotted with flour. Yuuri probably would have been the better choice for this task, but he’s enjoying the view, enjoying being taken care of. It’s been a long while since he’s felt like this. 

He would even venture to call it _safe_.

“Thank you for cooking,” Yuuri says as he smears a a slice of turkey with gravy before sinking his teeth in and stifling a moan. He can’t remember the last time he’s had a true home-cooked meal, and it sure as hell beats all the takeout he’s littered his body with.

“It’s my pleasure,” Victor replies, gifting Yuuri with one of his rare smiles. Another reason to be grateful, then.

“I’m glad we could both get away.” And he is. Yuuri’s so happy for this sliver of escape, time spent for just the two of them. He would give up everything just to stay here and live a simple life with the man who has claimed his heart.

Victor nods, his expression so soft. “I’m glad I get to spend the day with you.”

“And the entire weekend,” Yuuri laughs.

When dinner is finished, Yuuri clears their plates, but Victor bumps him aside from the sink with his hip. “Let me,” he says.

And to Yuuri’s protest of, “But you cooked the _entire dinner_ ,” Victor offers, “Then how about you make us some coffee?” His hands are already wrist-deep in dish water and soap, and Yuuri admits defeat.

So Yuuri lights up the kettle and switches on the radio instead, filling the house with the holiday spirit. Normally the early presence of Christmas music would annoy him— _can’t anyone wait until December anymore_ —but now he finds he doesn’t mind. More so than Christmas, there’s something else he’s looking forward to celebrating.

By the time the coffee is finished brewing, Victor is crouching in front of the fireplace, adding another log to the pile and coaxing the flames to burn more brightly. “Here you go,” he says as he hands over a steaming mug, bending to place a kiss on Victor’s forehead. Victor smiles again as he stands and accepts, and Yuuri’s heart is more than full now, it’s positively _bursting_.

Yuuri leads them to the couch and tosses the blanket over them, snuggling close into Victor’s warm side, Victor’s arm automatically falling to circle his shoulders. He can feel the rumble of Victor’s low laugh behind him, and he can’t help but shiver as Victor presses a kiss to his hair. _God_ , he adores this man _so much_.

“Think it’ll snow?” Victor murmurs, his chin still resting atop Yuuri’s head. He gazes out to the frost collecting at the edge of the windows.

“It’s cold enough to,” Yuuri says, warm and content and _happy_. “I wouldn’t mind if it did.”

“I didn’t think you liked winter weather,” Victor says, amusement coloring his voice. “You certainly steal the covers enough.”

Yuuri nudges Victor with his elbow, not enough to hurt but almost enough to spill his coffee, but Victor laughs anyways. Makkachin woofs from her place beside the fire. “I don’t,” Yuuri says, only vaguely concealing his pout, “But I wouldn’t mind being snowed in here with you.”

Yuuri can’t see it, but he can hear the smile in Victor’s next words. “Then I sure hope it does.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s another night to the books.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 5 December 2018. For Leedelee.

It’s another night to the books. Chris sighs as he drops the dishrag onto the edge of the sink, feeling the ache starting to settle into the small of his back. Standing for hours is never easy on his body, even fit as his is, but he would never trade this life for pushing papers behind a desk or screaming into a phone on Wall Street. 

Somewhat surprisingly, though, his little _repaire d'iniquité_ had been rather dead tonight. It isn’t often that Casa Roja feels empty, but it _is_ the middle of January. Bitter cold, still early enough into the new year to feel optimistic but still too early to feel the impending pangs of Valentine’s. 

Perhaps his patrons were chasing away the winter chill elsewhere.

Wiping his hands down his apron, Chris checks his watch and surveys the bar. He had already swept and mopped, the tables all wiped, napkins and garnishes restocked. All that’s left is to take out the garbage, and then he can fall into the sweet embrace of his bed.

His rather lonely bed, but comfortable nonetheless.

Chris has never particularly favored this time of year. It’s not that he buys into whatever _romantic_ notions of Valentine’s that shopkeepers try to sell him, but it’s just another reminder that he’s growing older. He’s not sure how long this lifestyle will last—he hopes he can skate it out until whenever prohibition is lifted, emerge as a reputable institution, and perhaps settle down with some pretty young thing he’s yet to meet.

Sighing again, Chris notes that the fourth barstool from the door has been conspicuously empty lately. The absence gnaws at his gut a little. Victor may not be a police officer anymore, but there’s a weird sense of protection whenever he’s around, and Chris can’t help but feel a little safer in Victor’s presence. Which is _odd_ , finding security in legal enforcement when one runs a decidedly illegal establishment, but it’s not the first time that Chris has wondered that maybe Victor’s patronage is what’s been keeping the boys in blue away.

He won’t say he _misses_ the man. Chris isn’t the type to wait around for someone who’s not even looking. But it’s far too easy to care. Victor is far too pleasing on the eyes for his own good, even with the sadness he’s wrapped himself in, which never quite leaves him despite the smiles and jests. Affectionate names roll off Chris’s tongue when Victor is near, smooth and burning like the cocktails he serves. _Chéri_ , he says, and wishes it were true, that Victor would take it seriously. He doesn’t seem to catch the more suggestive tones Chris has taken, so long ago, Chris wrote them off as a missed non-opportunity.

It’s not like he lacks for a partner in his bed when Chris wants one, but it would be nice if he could have someone of his own to come home to one day, besides his cat. Victor will just not be that person.

And it’s _fine_. Chris knows that there must be somebody else, now—somebody he himself had encouraged Victor to chase. The night _he_ had shown up, out of place and blown in on the heels of a snowstorm, the small candlelight Victor had been fighting to prevent from burning out with flashes of alcohol had suddenly flickered back to life. Chris might have had his misgivings initially (because he _knew_ what had happened, but he wasn’t about to judge the way people in this city cope with the times, especially not in his line of work), but he can’t deny the aftermath. No matter the darkening bags under his eyes, there’s a softness now to Victor that previously hadn’t been present, a strange sort of serenity. Chris does not pry—as a bartender he _listens_ , and while Victor has never once made mention, Chris _knows_.

He’s happy for Victor. He truly is. If anyone in this city is in need of a merciful dose of salvation, it’s him.

Just one more bag to haul into the dumpster, and Chris can close up shop. It’s beyond late, and his _petit_ waiting at home must be hungry. The sound of a door shutting diverts his attention. He could have sworn he’d already locked up, but the front door has been tricky ever since a group of hoodlums had tried—unsuccessfully—to raid his cabinets and till.

“I’m sorry, but it’s already past last call,” Chris says, smile apologetic and easily falling into place. His patrons may not all give their names, but Chris never forgets a face. He’s sure they’ll understand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...and then we all know what happens in chapter 8 :(((((


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If it’s change Victor wanted, change is certainly what he gets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 15 December 2018. Actors AU^AU!

If it’s change Victor wanted, change is certainly what he gets. While he never turned his nose up at the chance of making a movie, the whole process had started to taste stale. Not that a miniseries would _truly_ be much different, but the time investment for such a project makes him feel a little less like a factory churning out work after work. At the very least, Victor would be able to linger in the story’s world a measure longer, really sink his teeth into a role and hold onto it rather than quickly digest and move onto the next paycheck.

It was the reason he signed onto the network-exclusive show in the first place. Intriguing script, a budget sizable to attract and retain quality work and talent, something to showcase versatility on his already-impressive filmography. Sure, Victor has a career’s worth of award-winning movies and roles under his belt—he’s not known as a living legend without merit—but he wants to prove he has the longevity to do this.

Victor sits in front of his dressing room vanity, paging through his lines as a makeup artist flits about him, combing back his hair and dusting his face with powder. It’s the first day of shooting, but Victor hadn’t been able to attend any of the pre-production read-throughs with the rest of the cast due to other prior commitments. He had offered to try to make it work, but the director had shrugged him off. “I know you’re good for it,” she had said over videoconference. “Besides, it’ll be more interesting this way, right? With no screen tests, we’ll get to see the real magic unfold before our eyes.” She’d sounded so confident in his abilities, her wink absolutely _devious_.

He’s certainly not _nervous_. He’s a professional, after all. Although Victor has worked with a few of the other cast members in the past—Christophe and Georgi will be welcome, familiar faces—it is the first time Victor will be paired with the man known as the “Prince of the Silver Screen.” Yuuri Katsuki might be a relative newcomer, but he has quickly established himself as a rising star, excelling at an impressive breadth of leading television roles. All the gossip rags are already _delighting_ over the impending clash between the veteran “Golden King” and the upstart Prince.

He suppresses rolling his eyes, not wanting to inadvertently offend anyone who might be watching him. Because on set, there’s always _someone_ watching. Victor knows he can be a bit _dramatic_ , but he doesn’t seek out drama in his workplace. He simply wants to come in, get along as best as he can with the cast and crew, and do a job he’ll be proud of later.

A stirring outside his open door catches Victor’s attention, but he pushes the distraction aside, not eager to waste his remaining free time to investigate. He knows his lines by heart, so he really doesn’t need to practice. Some might call it superstition, or perhaps even a good luck charm. But it’s more habit now than anything.

The first scene they’re shooting will set the entire tone for the project, so he has to be perfect. A whirlwind encounter brings the hardboiled detective and the elusive doctor together one snowy night, sending them careening down a path of love and destruction. Victor can’t imagine what would happen for the rest of the months-long shoot if he and Yuuri wound up having zero chemistry. It’s happened before with his other costars, and while Victor has always made it work, the work itself was less than pleasant. He hopes this won’t be the case.

“Mr. Nikiforov?” The voice that calls him is light and melodic. Standing outside Victor’s door is none other than the subject of his thoughts, the Prince himself. Yuuri Katsuki, with his hair gelled back, brown eyes so warm and deep, and a sharp suit accentuating his lithe frame, looks nothing like Victor’s ever seen of him from the YouTube clips he had watched. 

Yuuri enters the room, extending a hand with a smile, his head slightly ducking. His cheeks take on a wonderfully rosy hue. “I wanted to greet you before we started working, since we hadn’t gotten a chance to meet before. I’ve been looking forward to working with you.”

Victor swallows as he accepts the offered hand. Yuuri’s palm is smaller in his own, soft and almost delicate.

The smile grows wider. Yuuri’s lips glint with clear gloss. “I’ll be leaving myself in your care.”

Oh. Oh, no.

Oh, he’s absolutely _fucked_.

He clears his throat. “The pleasure is all mine.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I plan on writing a bit more for this AU^AU, so stay tuned! ;3


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The problem is, they might have too _much_ chemistry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 16 December 2018. More Actors AU^AU!

The problem is, they might have too _much_ chemistry.

Yuuri, once the director calls action, transforms on set. Gone is the mild-mannered man Victor has read about, and in his place rises the Doctor, a seductive and darkly dangerous force of nature. Working alongside Yuuri, Victor can tell he’s a natural. He has his own presence—he doesn’t need to rely on Victor to guide the scene, but he instead complements Victor and plays off his energy. When they exchange lines, Victor finds it easy to slip into the role of the Detective, almost as if it wasn’t a role he was playing, but perhaps a past life.

There’s a buzzing beneath his skin that Victor hasn’t felt in _ages_ —probably not even since his early years. He’s...excited to be sitting here, next to this talented and beautiful young man. To have been given this opportunity.

And then it hits him.

He’s nervous.

Victor wishes the liquid in his glass really _was_ the burning elixir of alcohol. Because soon...

Yuuri excuses himself, and the roiling in Victor’s gut flashes like solar flares with each passing minute he must wait for Yuuri’s return. Victor plays with the lip of his glass, imagining it’s Yuuri’s lips instead. Soon, it _will_ be.

He’s a _professional_ , goddamnit. Not some hormonal, love-struck teenager. No matter how alluring Yuuri may be, Victor isn’t looking for another scandal. He’d had his share of them when he had been young and could blame it on stupid naivety (to his manager’s endless relief). His manager would have his hide if he were to start something with his costar on the _first day of shooting_.

Victor knows better, but it’s difficult to keep that particular bit of wisdom in mind when said temptation is pulling him into very close quarters. Even with the dozens of crew members surrounding them and the cameras trained at their faces, it’s somehow easy to forget about them and focus purely on Yuuri. Yuuri, who is pressed up against him in this tiny phone booth, mouthing hungrily against Victor’s neck and pulling at his clothing. Who is sliding his hands down Victor’s body, igniting hot trails in his wake. Whose hands are over Victor’s hips and simulating something Victor wants desperately to lean into.

And yes, Yuuri is getting paid to do this—so is _he_ —but something long-neglected in Victor desires to cast that knowledge aside and trick himself into believing. In what, exactly, Victor does not know. He does not really even know this man; they just met today. But perhaps Victor wants to believe in the simple possibility that there’s the seedling of something real ready to take root, if they both would just allow it.

But Victor can agonize over all that later, in the privacy of his trailer. Maybe he’ll be able to convince Makkachin’s handlers to allow her to join him during that self-pitying session. For now, he has a job to do. Victor closes his eyes and loses himself in the sensations, channeling his character. Yuuri’s hair is thick and soft between his fingers, and when his hands travel downward, he can nearly circle Yuuri’s slight waist with them. Yuuri swings between fervent gropes and gentle caresses, as though he can’t quite reconcile what’s happening. His moans tremble against Victor’s lips, and his mouth tastes like the citrus of his drink. And Yuuri knows what to do with that mouth to draw out noises of Victor’s own, seeks to wreck the Detective with every nip of teeth or slip of tongue.

God, it’s _maddening_ , and Victor has never in his life sympathized more with a character he’s played. A traitorous part of his heart wants those words being uttered to be for _him_. And Victor can’t even escape this—even in the dark of the booth, Yuuri’s eyes blaze with a fire Victor finds himself wanting to be consumed by.

The banging on the door is a merciful relief. If the scene were to go on much longer, Victor might have had to deal with a very embarrassing situation. If he’s honest with himself, he’s not yet completely in the clear in _that_ regard. Victor hastily redresses himself and chases after the Doctor, the blast of winter air welcome upon his too-warm skin.

His life, Victor decides in that moment, is simply unfair. He had worked hard, been blessed by good fortune, and now will be ruined by a man he cannot have. Yuuri, perched against the street lamp, his body relieved in contrasts of shade and smoke and glowing orange, is a vision of his doom. Victor somehow reignites his brain to produce his lines. Maybe puts a little too much of himself into this last kiss, which doesn’t feel like goodbye at all, but a promise too hesitant to be spoken aloud. Yuuri smiles sweet like poison as he presses the cigarette between Victor’s lips and saunters away like a storm that’s swept in and gone.

“And cut!” comes the cry from outside their little bubble, breaking the spell. “Good job, boys,” the director praises as Yuuri rejoins them at the center, “You both really went for it. A perfect take, in one shot! Those nicknames aren’t just for talk.” A bustle of activity engages as the crew preps the next location. “Yuuri, that’s it for you today. Victor, we’ll resume in two hours for the hotel interrogation.”

Victor nods blithely, plucking the cigarette out of his mouth and crushing it underfoot. Yuuri thanks them both with short little bows, that rosy flush once again returned to his cheeks. He then turns and disappears, a mimicry of his character mere moments ago.

As Victor makes his way back to his trailer, his head trapped in a daze, he’s stopped by a hand on his shoulder. He turns, expecting—hoping—to see Yuuri, but it’s Christophe, instead. Victor tries not to let the disappointment show too clearly on his face.

“Chris,” he greets, an easy smile settling over his features. “Good job, just now.”

Chris merely shakes his head. He drops his voice to a whisper. “Victor, _mon ami_. What the hell was that?”

Victor, to his credit, doesn’t try to deny and can’t bring himself to feel ashamed. “I’d like to know, myself.”


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The auction night, when it finally comes, is grueling to film.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 19 December 2018. More Actors AU^AU, this time chapter 11's auction~

The auction night, when it finally comes, is grueling to film. There are so many moving pieces and extras to herd, so many different camera angles to film and limited times to film them, that this particular episode takes almost an entire week to complete. But today’s shoot will be the last few scenes, and if Victor can get these done right, then they will have a day off to relax and regroup. Victor very much wants to give this to the crew.

He’s not exactly thrilled about the scenes he will be working on, though. Long days flowing into long nights have worn down Victor’s morale, and he feels as exhausted and sleep-deprived as his character. Victor has never been too fond of coffee, but he’s been chugging it at every given opportunity that he is convinced the drink currently constitutes at least sixty percent of his body. If he could get an IV drip of it, then all the better.

Well, there might be some credence to life imitating art and all that.

The chilly night air is probably the only thing keeping Victor’s mind present, despite having a literal gun to his head. Victor can barely focus with Yuuri’s body pressed flush against his back, hand lingering right above Victor’s heart and chin resting lightly upon Victor’s shoulder. Michele, a guest star for this episode, is screaming at him, and by this point, Victor relies on rote memorization to get him through the scene. It’s probably not his best performance, but Victor can only hope his own personal tiredness and confliction translate well to his character.

Yuuri’s arms, strong and muscled, are a distraction, snaking around to hold Victor like a shield. Yuuri handling a gun _does_ things to Victor, and he fleetingly wonders what the Doctor would have to say about that, although Victor got a taste of _that_ not too long ago. Can Yuuri feel the hammering in his chest, just beneath the fabric of his tuxedo? Victor could easily chalk it up to a lot of things: the adrenaline of the scene, the anxiety from staring down the barrel of a lethal weapon, an oversupply of caffeine coursing through his system. But the truth is always the most embarrassing: those possessive words, that authoritative tone, and the way Yuuri clings to him as though he owns him make Victor weak in the knees. Victor would bet good money that if he were to collapse right now, Yuuri would be sure to catch him.

Not like that is an option, exhaustion or irrational desire beside the point: fucking up means doing this all over again, forcing everyone to work that much longer.

His mind latches onto Yuuri’s voice like a magnet in the vicinity of its match.

_“Do you understand what that means?”_

No, Victor doesn’t. He has never belonged to anyone. He isn’t sure if he ever wants to know, or if he is meant for that kind of commitment, but sometimes the way those amber eyes look at him makes Victor curious.

Victor shivers. Yuuri shifts behind him, holding him a little bit tighter.

By the grace of whichever kind deity who decides to grant them mercy, they get through the scene. The director spends an agonizing minute reviewing the reel before giving the okay, and Victor sighs audibly in relief.

“You alright?” Yuuri asks, placing a palm against the small of Victor’s back. “We can ask for a small break, if you need it.”

How cute. The young pup looking out for the veteran. He’s not _that_ old yet to merit such concern. Victor flashes what he hopes is a disarming smile. “No. Thanks, but I’m fine.”

Yuuri stares at him quietly for a few moments but then nods. “If you say so.”

It doesn’t sit well with Victor, but he decides not to argue. 

The next scene proves to be significantly harder than anything Victor has ever filmed. They start and stop so many times, often just when he and Yuuri seem to find a rhythm. Each successive “Cut!” grates on Victor’s already frayed nerves. And the worst of it: it’s never called due to his or Yuuri’s fault. While the hotel room they are shooting in is picturesque, the floor-to-ceiling windows catch too many of the crew’s reflections and bounce around too much light, to the director’s intense displeasure. She isn’t quite scowling—yet—but a firm frown has cemented itself on her face over the past hour.

Their first run-through of the final scene is uncharacteristically disastrous. Yuuri is far too tense, his expressions and body rigid, when he should be languid and persuasive. He grimaces during the kiss scenes, and Victor forces himself to work harder to meet him and pull them both through to the end. “Again,” the director demands, and Victor is inclined to agree.

Victor isn’t sure what is going on in Yuuri’s head today, but it’s taxing enough to worry about his own performance. They are both in various states of undress, and while Victor has never been uncomfortable with his body or presenting it in front of a camera, he can tell Yuuri does not share that same sentiment. He is quick to cover up between takes, retreating both from Victor and the watchful lens. Yuuri, who over the weeks has begun to seek out Victor’s company, now flees from it.

It’s a little distressing, sure, but Victor will deal with that later. He’s tired down to his _bones_ , and he’s really counting on this next take being the final.

But something needs to be said. As the crew readies the scene, Victor corners his costar. He hates pulling this card, but he can’t allow some personal problem to interfere with work.

“Yuuri,” he says, careful to keep his tone neutral.

Yuuri jumps and whirls around, his glasses falling askew. “Y-yes?” His eyes search Victor’s face, but Victor makes sure he’ll find nothing there.

He smiles, pleasant. “I’m not sure what’s going on, but you need to relax. We’ll never get a good result as it is now.”

Yuuri’s ears darken to red, and oh, Victor feels like shit.

“I’m so–” Yuuri starts before snapping his mouth shut. His lips form a thin line. He looks around the room before meeting Victor’s gaze. “You’re right. I’ll do better this time.”

Nodding, Victor turns and retakes his place on set.

“And… _action!_ ”

Like a switch flipping, Yuuri dissolves in front of Victor’s eyes, the Doctor taking over. He pulls Victor playfully from the elevator, a beautiful flush dusting across the bridge of his nose. “Come on. Stop thinking. Come on...” he enjoins.

So Victor tries.

Yuuri spins himself around, arms outstretched. His eyes glitter with mirth.

Victor reaches inside and finds the Detective, who seems to be lurking just below the surface of himself these days.

Okay. So. He is in the most expensive hotel room in the city with the most beautiful man he has ever seen, who is self-destructing before his eyes. The last time he had been in this room, he had been investigating a body littered with bullets. He has a rendezvous point to meet. He is holding onto the end of his rope by the barest of strings, and soon he will be in over his head.

“Stop. No shop talk—not tonight. Please?” Yuuri begs, his voice matching the shaking in his hands. Looking like that, so small and vulnerable, Victor absolutely understands how his Detective could never deny this man anything.

“Are you really okay?” he asks as Yuuri peels Victor’s garments off of him. Yuuri laughs and pulls him close. Victor falls willingly into his warm embrace.

He drags Yuuri to the center of the room. “Are...are you high?” The light from the chandelier overhead adds a honey hue to Yuuri’s eyes. Victor can’t help it—he touches Yuuri’s cheek, gently tracing it with his fingertips, causing Yuuri’s long eyelashes to flutter in response.

Yuuri sucks in a breath. “I’m high on Life and Love. And everything else in between.”

Life and love. It’s like this script is meant to stab Victor right in the chest. He steels his heart and pushes forward.

“You’re too kind…you’re always so kind to me.”

He didn’t feel so kind, just moments ago. But it had been _necessary_.

“I need you. Here, with me. Can you…can you stay?”

He wants to be needed. He would stay for however long Yuuri wanted him.

“Of course,” Victor answers instead. If he holds Yuuri a little longer than the scene calls for, Yuuri never lets on. He walks them both back to the bedroom, setting Yuuri down onto the edge of the bed. For not the first time that day, Victor bends to unlace Yuuri’s shoes and slip them off his feet.

Soon enough, Yuuri is ripping the clothes from his body, the fine tuxedo jacket and waistcoat dropping haphazardly to the floor. Victor ignores the comments about work and payment—he doesn’t need reminders that each kiss and caress he receives from Yuuri originates from a contracted obligation. Yuuri climbs over Victor, and it doesn’t even feel like acting when Victor stares up at him and tries to negotiate with a weak “Please. I’m tired.”

Yuuri cards his fingers through Victor’s hair, and Victor resists pressing into them.

“That’s fine. You don’t have to do anything… I’ll do all the work.”

A kiss graces the inside of his wrist. His necktie is tugged off and brings darkness to his vision. Pants are yanked down his legs. Kisses trail down the line of his body, exposed and wanting, painting painful promises like “You can trust me.”

And then Victor is being led up and forward, the glass as cold and unforgiving against his bare skin as it had been the previous multitude of takes. It isn’t acting when Victor gasps against the window, or when he shudders as Yuuri mouths at the juncture of his neck and shoulder, or even when he arches as Yuuri holds his hips down and slides against him, his thighs a heavy presence. Unlike in previous takes, Yuuri does not hesitate this time—he takes, just as Victor’s Detective had commanded him to do.

And Victor _wants_ to give himself over.

But when Yuuri threads his fingers with Victor’s, presses him bodily against the window and whispers “Mine” so tenderly into his ear, the broken cry that tears out of Victor’s throat is startlingly real.

It’s like Yuuri fractures in that moment, too. Although Victor cannot see him, everything in Yuuri seems to crumple as he guides Victor back to the bed, apologies tumbling helplessly from his lips. Hands fret hesitantly over his body, at once afraid and desperate for contact, like Yuuri’s the one who needs comfort rather than Victor. Victor lies there, the stream of tears rolling down his cheeks soaking the necktie still uncomfortable around his face.

With one last outburst, Victor drops back onto the bed. He lets his mind go blank as Yuuri moves around him, wiping the tears from Victor’s face and sliding down to the floor.

“Cut!”

God, Victor has never been so thankful to hear that word.

He slowly pushes himself up to his elbows and unties the makeshift blindfold from around his head. He catches sight of Yuuri, still on the floor, but Yuuri won’t look at him. His gaze is intent upon the director, his eyebrows furrowed into sharp angles. 

The director has her arms crossed as she plays back the recording. Victor’s heart is beating so hard he can feel it all the way in his throat.

“I think...one more time. Can you do it?”

“No,” comes Yuuri’s immediate reply. God, he’s still not looking at Victor. 

“Yes,” Victor contests, feeling an unpleasant flaring in his gut. What the hell is Yuuri thinking, telling her no? Victor can do it. They’re fucking _professionals_ ; this is what they do. It’s their goddamned _jobs_ to not stop until the director is pleased.

Yuuri turns to face him slowly, his eyes wide but expression otherwise obscured. He does not argue against Victor, instead picking himself off the floor and shuffling quickly off set.

Moments later, they film another take. It feels like agony.

It’s perfect.

But this time, Yuuri stays seated on the floor, his head bowed into the edge of the bed. The tears won’t stop pouring from his eyes, and his body continues to tremble although the cameras are no longer rolling. It takes Victor a moment to register that Yuuri is crying for real.

But why? They’re finally done; they can rest. 

Yuuri should be happy.

“Why would I be happy?” Yuuri answers, but Victor hadn’t even realized he had spoken aloud. Yuuri wipes roughly at his face, which is ruddy and slightly puffy around his eyes. His eyelashes are visibly wet. “I didn’t like doing that to you,” he says, looking at Victor as though he were on the precipice of breaking. “The look on your face. How could I be happy about that?”

“But it’s just a performance,” Victor says, the words feeling numb. “It’s not real.”

Yuuri spits out something between a scoff and a bark of laughter. His hands fist into the bedsheets; he still has not risen from the floor. “It may not mean anything to you, but I’m not _used_ to this. I don’t know how to not let it affect me.” Yuuri looks up at Victor, but his eyes are clouded and empty. “I’m not a cruel person, Victor.”

Oh. That’s not– 

He hadn’t meant it like that.

Clutching the opened shirt around him, Victor scrambles over to the end of the mattress, covering Yuuri’s hands with his own. They’re cold, when usually they are so warm. “I know that, Yuuri. I shouldn’t have pressed for another take.” He squeezes Yuuri’s hands, hoping the other man will recognize his sincerity. “It was my mistake—I should have noticed how upset you were.”

His words have the opposite effect: Yuuri pushes him away. “Don’t,” he says, a spark lighting in his eyes. “I won’t have you try to make excuses for my weaknesses. How can I face you as an equal if you’re always–”

“I’m not,” comes the automatic retort. God, how colossally can he fuck this up? Victor shouldn’t be doing this, least of all _here_ , and maybe it’s more than he should let on, but Yuuri needs to know. “Yuuri, you’re wonderful. Truly. I wake up excited every day to be together with you. You’re not weak, I’m just…” 

Just _what_ , though? Bull-headed? A perfectionist? Plagued by a desire to prove that he’s still relevant, that all these years spent hollowing out his spirit have meant something?

He searches Yuuri’s eyes. “I don’t know how to turn it off,” he finishes truthfully.

The tears have finally stopped, but the fight doesn’t appear to have left Yuuri. He worries at his bottom lip with his teeth as his gaze shifts across Victor’s face, as though he were picking apart the honesty in his statement, not quite sure what to do with that information. After a few minutes of silence punctuated by sniffles, Yuuri nods and then buries his face back into the sheets.

“I feel so stupid.”

“You’re not stupid,” Victor laughs incredulously, to which Yuuri mumbles incoherently.

Victor pats Yuuri’s hair. “Sorry, didn’t catch that.” Another strangled noise emits from his costar.

Victor laughs again, this time with a lightness seeping into his heart. “Hey,” he says, tapping against Yuuri’s head. “Come here.”

Amber eyes peek out from under dark bangs, the pout evident even as the rest of Yuuri’s face remains obscured. Victor hooks his hands underneath Yuuri’s arms and hauls him up until he’s on the bed again next to Victor, then pulls the covers from their hold. He drapes the blankets over Yuuri’s shoulders, using them to draw Yuuri near enough to hold him.

“Thanks,” Victor murmurs into Yuuri’s hair. “I know you were just trying to look out for me.” It shouldn’t feel so nice, so _right_ , to have Yuuri wrapped up in his arms like this. They’re just colleagues, after all.

Yuuri, adorably, burrows into Victor’s chest. In the long run, Victor knows he will regret this. Knows he’ll only end up hurt. He indulges in it anyway, because it isn’t like it will be the first time, and maybe he can convince himself to merely enjoy these feelings while they last. While they’re available.

“You should listen to me next time.”

The warmth filling his chest is only partially attributable to the heat of the man held against him. “Okay,” Victor promises. That, at least, he can do.


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They begin to spend more weekends outside of the city, leaving Friday nights and returning early Monday mornings, just in time for Victor to report in for work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 23 December 2018. Happy 1st anniversary to BMAAHD and Happy Vicmas!

They begin to spend more weekends outside of the city, leaving Friday nights and returning early Monday mornings, just in time for Victor to report in for work. Yuuri is never pleased about having to rise so early, but they get to wake up curled around each other and spend the morning together, and Victor always makes breakfast and wakes Yuuri with a kiss (or sometimes a little more), so it makes the ungodly hour a little more bearable.

Even Makkachin has become used to this new routine. She waits eagerly by the door every Friday night and barks excitedly when Yuuri’s overly fancy car pulls up in front of the building, exactly at half-past six like clockwork. When they arrive, she practically bursts from the car, darting directly to the beach and frolicking in the waves, no matter the temperature. On more than one occasion, Victor has had to haul her out of the freezing water, sopping wet and kicking, much to Yuuri’s endless amusement. Victor thinks Makkachin might be starting to act a little younger these days despite the grays in her coat—perhaps she finds this place as healing as he does, or perhaps the ocean air is good for her. Victor found her in a rainstorm all those years ago, so maybe being by the water blesses Makkachin with new life.

Days are spent fixing the small house up. Old fixtures are replaced. Walls are stripped of peeling wallpaper and given a fresh coat of paint, the color of which they debated for hours over paint chips at the hardware store. Together they replace worn shingles and battered windows, and Victor repairs the creaky front steps. Yuuri cleans years of dust and grime from the shelves and baseboards and pays for the installation of new appliances.

Over time, the empty house starts to fill. Yuuri takes them to a department store a city away, and together they select a modest bedroom and living room set, as well as a small kitchen table. With every passing weekend, more decorations and knick-knacks appear: a clock on the fireplace mantel, two placemats and a set of utensils, a throw blanket for the couch, a shallow bowl for fruit. Even Makkachin gets her own dog bed and a hook for her leash. “For staging,” Yuuri insists, “it’ll help buyers envision themselves living there.” 

But more than that, other things begin to show up, without any real explanation. They no longer pack travel toiletries, but instead two toothbrushes sit in a cup by the bathroom sink, along with Victor’s shaving kit, and Yuuri’s expensive soap takes up residence by the tub. New towels and spare sheets are stacked in the linen closet. And when Victor peers into the wardrobe, clothing he swears he never bought (or could afford to buy) hang inside next to Yuuri’s, in exactly his size.

The nights become shorter and the mornings become longer as winter gives way to spring. Victor watches as Yuuri digs into the soil, planting rows of small bushes and flowers as Makkachin sniffs around at the earth beside him. The whistling of the kettle calls Victor back to the kitchen, where he retrieves two new and matching mugs from the cabinets and measures coffee grounds into the press. As he pours the hot water into the carafe, steam billowing comfortably around his fingers, Victor begins to wonder if Yuuri really means to sell the place, or if they are starting to make a home together. 

A happy bark from outside catches his attention, and Victor turns in time to see Yuuri throwing a large stick, Makkachin racing after it. He has dirt trailing up his elbows, his is face shiny with sweat, and he is wearing the brightest of smiles.

Home can be a lot of things, Victor decides. Heavy paws and wet licks. A man to whom he’s given his heart. An old house purchased for more than its value, but invested with love and care.

Victor looks out to the mailbox, slightly bent and aged with rust. The hinge to the door sticks; they would be better off replacing it. One day, maybe sometime soon, they might file paperwork for an address change. 

Victor looks forward to that day.


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You have some paint in your hair,” Yuuri tells him as they clean up the haphazard arrangement of open paint cans and brushes spread upon the tarp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 29 December 2018. For Orchids and Yuiko, a series of prompts from the Discord server ♥ This one earns the (light) E rating!

“You have some paint in your hair,” Yuuri tells him as they clean up the haphazard arrangement of open paint cans and brushes spread upon the tarp. After this, they only have one more room to paint, but dusk has already started to creep along the horizon, blotting out the natural light, and Victor’s knees have reached their limit.

Victor almost runs a hand through his hair but thinks better of it after looking at his paint-splattered palms. He blows at his bangs, using the back of his hand to rub at an itchy spot on his cheek. He’s fairly certain he’ll find paint in more places than just his hair.

How Yuuri managed to emerge from this work session with only his fingertips covered in pale yellow and a stripe of paint near his left wrist, Victor hasn’t a clue. “Guess I’ll hop into the shower after we get this in order,” he says as he stoops to collect the empty cans. “I can finish up here if you want the first go.”

Yuuri turns to him, his eyes casting up and down Victor critically, one eyebrow quirked. “You look like you need it more than I do,” he smirks, flicking a bit of paint in Victor’s direction. A fresh, wet spray hits Victor on his nose.

After depositing the empty cans into the trash bin outside, Victor makes his way to the bathroom, stretching his arms overhead. He closes the door behind him and carefully begins to peel his clothes off, mindful to keep any still-tacky spots folded into themselves and off the tiles. Gazing into the mirror, Victor assesses the damage. Yuuri was right: he has a nice little blob of paint near his right ear—how and when had that even happened?—along with a few streaks along his jawline, in addition to the flecks from Yuuri’s teasing. His outfit is a lost cause, entirely. Paint tracks lines along the knees of his pants, soaking into the edges of the bottom hems, as well as a rather large splotch on his backside from when he’d accidentally bumped into the still-wet wall. His shirt isn’t much better off: paint drips like polka dots up his sleeves, arcs along his collar, and coats an entire button. He’ll throw them both into the laundry after his shower, but they have now been permanently demoted to labor attire.

Sighing, Victor bends over the edge of the tub, turning on the taps and running his hand through the water to check the temperature. The water is icy cold; it always takes a little longer to heat, but once it does, it rapidly kicks over to almost scalding. The water heater is finicky like that, which makes showers at the beach house sometimes tricky to navigate, but Victor’s not about to complain. Sometimes, these weekend trips with Yuuri are the only things that keep him sane. Deciding not to waste water, Victor scrubs his hands together underneath the running water, dried paint flakes swirling down the drain.

Victor hears the door click shut behind him. “If you changed your mind, too bad, I’m not accepting take-backs,” he calls over his shoulder. The water is tepid, but it’ll do for now. He turns at the center knob until the water redirects, sputtering out of the showerhead.

Yuuri’s hand closes over Victor’s on the handle, turning it so that the water stops completely. His hand is spotless and he has his sleeves rolled up to his elbows—he must have washed the paint off in the kitchen sink. Victor wrinkles his nose and looks up at Yuuri, question posed in his eyes. 

But instead of answering, Yuuri gently bumps Victor out of the way and crouches to plug the tub. He turns the faucet back on and tests the water, adjusting the handles as the water begins to fill. “It works better if you take a bath,” he says, as if barging in and policing the method in which Victor cleans himself is perfectly normal behavior for grown adults.

“But showers are quicker,” Victor replies as he watches the waterline inch upward. “Who has time anymore for baths?”

“You do,” Yuuri says, matter-of-fact. His glasses glint with the faint light from the vanity. “When was the last time you gave yourself time for a bath?”

Victor crosses his arms and scratches at his chin as he thinks back, uncaring of his nakedness. “I don’t know. Maybe twenty years ago? I was still a kid.”

Something like determination sets into the line of Yuuri’s brow. He licks his bottom lip and stalks over, grasping Victor by both shoulders and pushing him deliberately towards the tub. “Sounds like a good time to remedy that,” he whispers into Victor’s ear as he presses up against Victor’s back. It’s unfair—a low blow, really. Victor’s knees already feel weak from a day of painting, and once he steps over the ledge, they quickly buckle beneath him. Water sloshes up the sides of the tub as Victor settles in.

It’s an odd feeling. Not really knowing what to do, he flexes his toes as the water creeps up, a warm embrace that soothes his tired muscles. Yuuri drags a stool across the room and settles behind him, reaching over to the shelf and pouring generous amounts of product from glass bottles with expensive-looking labels into the water. As the oils scatter across the surface of the water, Victor feels like he has suddenly been transported into a field of flowers. Clusters of small bubbles sprout atop the surface of the water, not enough for a proper bubble bath, but enough to collect and swish his hands through.

“Relax,” Yuuri purrs, leaning over to cut the water off. He pushes downward on Victor’s shoulders until he slides farther down into the tub, the water now lapping against his clavicles. His fingers gently comb through Victor’s hair. “May I?”

Victor nods his head, not really trusting his voice. Mama used to play with his hair like this. It made him feel so cherished, her touches light and full of affection. Yuuri dips a shallow bowl into the water and carefully tips it over Victor’s head, using his free hand as a shield to block the water from pouring onto his face. Victor bends his head forward and closes his eyes. He breathes in deeply. The familiar scent of Yuuri’s shampoo washes over him as he feels Yuuri work a handful of it through his hair, his strong fingers working up a lather that spills over Victor’s ears. Victor hums to himself as Yuuri dedicates himself to his task, gradually changing the motions from firm glides across his scalp into softer circular kneading. He can’t remember the last time someone else had spoiled him like this, much less the last time Victor had allowed someone to touch him so intimately outside the intent of getting off.

When he feels another wave of warm water wash over his head, Victor is surprised to find he had relaxed to the point where he had almost nodded off. He wipes the water from his face, his limbs heavy and content, and kicks his legs a little to pull waves in the bathwater. Yuuri chuckles behind him, his hands soft as they card through his hair and push it back from his face, lingering at his jaw.

“You could use a shave,” Yuuri murmurs quietly. “Would you allow me the honor?”

“You’d want to?” Victor asks, shifting as best as he can to look at Yuuri. His expression is open with adoration bright in his eyes—a rare sight that makes Victor shrink a little with self-consciousness. He’s keenly aware of how vulnerable he is, naked and lying against porcelain like an offering.

Yuuri doesn’t say anything but instead guides his hands back around Victor’s neck, lightly tipping Victor’s head back so that it rests along Yuuri’s knees. “Won’t your pants get wet?” Victor says, even as he leans back.

A small smile plays beautifully at Yuuri’s lips. “Don’t you worry about that.” He leans down and plants a fleeting kiss to Victor’s forehead. Victor closes his eyes and swallows the heartbeat that hammers in his throat.

Loud splashes bounce against his ear, followed by the slight pressure of a damp towel against his cheeks and neck, warm from the bathwater. Victor had glimpsed Yuuri shave before and is familiar with his routine, the scratching and clinking of his brush against the bowl a prelude to the cool and creamy lather that is spread in broad sweeps across his face like a painting. The sounds of rummaging as the bowl is put away. Yuuri’s left hand strokes tenderly at the side of Victor’s neck in warning, and then Victor feels the first drag of cool metal upon his skin.

Yuuri is measured in his actions, deftly working the straight razor in precise strokes, gentle even as he pulls Victor’s skin taut. Victor counts out the pattern: two upward passes punctuated by a pause for cleaning of the blade. Before long, a towel wipes over Victor’s face, and then the process starts anew, this time downward. It’s like Yuuri is tapping out a series of U’s in Morse code across his face: dot-dot-dash. 

Finally, Yuuri completes his task, and Victor marvels at how smooth his skin feels. Victor’s unsure if it’s due to Yuuri’s skill with the razor (he _had_ undergone training to be a surgeon, after all) or if Victor’s own safety razor at home just doesn’t do as good of a job, but no sign of stubble is left. Yuuri swats his hands away to apply aftershave lotion, and Victor shivers at its cooling effect and the foreignness of its presence upon his person. The scent is so strongly paired with Yuuri in his mind, that while it’s sometimes rubbed off on him when they are physical, Victor is unaccustomed to wearing the scent as his own.

It’s strange.

Yuuri produces a new wash cloth and attends to the rest of Victor’s body, working it in delicate caresses. The water tickles as it swirls around him, but Victor patiently watches as Yuuri tends to him, that determination softening but never leaving his expression. It warms Victor to his core, more than the water surrounding him. He catches Yuuri’s lips at the corner with his own, drawing a delightful flush to Yuuri’s cheeks.

After his body has been washed, the soap rinsed and the water drained, Yuuri pats Victor dry and wraps him up in a towel. Without warning, Yuuri hooks an arm under his knees and carries him to bed, and Victor doesn’t even try to fight it. Victor often forgets just how _strong_ Yuuri is, his tailored suits and coats disguising his lithe frame.

Victor reclines atop the bed, towel fanning out underneath him. The bedroom is warm, the fire from the living room seeping across the threshold. Makkachin is nowhere in sight, likely snoozing before the smoldering embers. Yuuri leans down next to Victor, running his hands down Victor’s body, gently massaging to his calves. He trails kisses in his wake, and Victor arches languidly beneath him, his breath halted to short bursts. Victor pulls Yuuri back up to him, seeking out his mouth, desperate to taste and feel the slide of Yuuri’s tongue against his. Yuuri obliges, his smile curving into Victor’s own, and Victor moans in contentment, happy and safe underneath Yuuri’s familiar weight and the remnants of burnt tobacco on his lips.

Yuuri taps fingertips along his collarbone, brushes over a nipple, presses into the ridges of his abdomen. Blunt fingernails scrape zig-zags over his navel in a slow descent down his hips. Victor sucks in a breath as Yuuri’s hand dances over the point of a hip bone teasingly, drifting to close over him. When Victor tries to reposition himself to angle his body toward Yuuri so that he can reach him, Yuuri braces a knee atop Victor’s thigh and pins his wrist against the sheets. “Shhh, let me take care of you,” he mouths into Victor’s neck, raking his teeth over the crest of his adam’s apple before smothering his protests with a sweet kiss.

All Victor knows is Yuuri: the bend of his body as it rests above him, his burning gaze as Yuuri touches him, the clean scent of his aftershave mingling with the smell of his skin thick in Victor’s nose and spreading into his lungs, the heady flavor of his lips. It’s distilled into the plush of their pillows and mattress beneath him, the walls of the room they share enclosing them, even into the moonlight peeking through their drawn curtains. Yuuri holds him with certainty, squeezing as he slides his hand along Victor’s hardening cock, and Victor is already mindless enough that he can’t bother to thrust into Yuuri’s grasp, fully entrusting Yuuri to see to shepherding his pleasure. 

His breath stutters in his chest as Yuuri bites down on the lobe of his ear, licking the shell of cartilage and muttering all the filthy ways Yuuri wants to take him one day. Victor can barely process the words—they’re more like a string of a melody plucked artfully on a cord, and Victor keens as his nerves ignite and compress, traversing through his limbs to converge at the friction building between his legs. The deep rumble of Yuuri’s laughter pushes Victor over the precipice, and Victor floats away with it like a feather upon the breeze. 

Victor’s head is still spinning as Yuuri’s weight is replaced by heavy blankets. Yuuri cradles Victor gently to his chest, as though he’s been gifted something precious, unwilling to break the fragility of the moment. His hands take up residence in Victor’s hair once again, tracing along the strands as Yuuri drops delicate kisses at the crown of his head. It takes Victor a few seconds to realize that Yuuri is quietly singing, but Victor can’t understand the words. He can pick apart some of the sounds, though, and he closes his eyes and melts into Yuuri’s embrace.

_”O do ma bon gi-ri bon gi-ri, bon ka-ra sa kya o ran do…”_

There’s something wistful in the way Yuuri sings, something nostalgic in the tone. On the scarce nights Mama was home at night, sometimes she would lie in bed with him like this, chanting songs from a land Victor does not know.

Victor drifts as darkness carries him into a dreamless sleep.

In the morning, Victor wakes to the familiar heft of Makkachin guarding his side, but Yuuri is absent from their bed. The sun is still a low-hanging flame upon the horizon. Yawning, Victor drags himself, blankets and all, to the kitchen, where he finds Yuuri standing in front of the stove in little more than his drawers, socks, and a half-buttoned shirt. Victor scoots up behind him, wrapping his arms around Yuuri’s waist, and noses at his neck. “This is a surprise.”

Yuuri leans back into him, a practiced motion. “Don’t expect anything fancy. It’s just toast and eggs.”

“It’s perfect,” Victor murmurs as he rests his chin upon Yuuri’s shoulder, ever so slightly tightening his hold around the other man. It’s Sunday, so they’ll have to return to the city the next morning. Victor wishes _this_ was their reality, and not the short reprieve. 

Yuuri pats against Victor’s hands. “This is almost done. Go set the table?”

Victor, with only a bit of reluctance and a swiftly-stolen kiss, obliges.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Itsuki Lullaby” is a folk song from Kyuushuu. The lyrics are purposefully written out by sound here, rather than by transliteration.


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He should have been paying closer attention instead of allowing the paperwork strewn across his desk to distract him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 31 December 2018. Omegaverse AU^AU, part 2.

He should have been paying closer attention instead of allowing the paperwork strewn across his desk to distract him. If only he had been more careful, Yuuri would have noticed before the harbinger of his doom strode through his doorway. Would have had a moment to school his face into that of a placid professional, not the wide-eyed dread he has no control over.

“It’s open,” Yuuri announces as he examines the file on his six o’clock appointment. He’s already read it several times, annotations penciled into the margins, but it never hurts to be overly prepared. This particular patient is...a special case.

That preparation flies out the door when the man steps through with a hesitant “Dr. Katsuki?” Yuuri very nearly flies out the door after it.

Who would have even guessed? Yuuri doesn’t have to look up to confirm—the scent that haunts his dreams slams against him like a brick wall, nearly bowling him over. No universe exists in which Yuuri would ever forget that fragrance.

God, what were the odds? Is his life truly intent on proving his misfortune?

When Yuuri had fled from his stranger that snowy eve, he had thrown the encounter far from his mind. Their paths were never meant to cross once more. There were _millions_ of people hustling in this city from dawn until dusk and into the inky black of night, drifting through congested streets, keeping their heads down just to live to see another day. Meeting again like this, after Yuuri had already bended to cowardice… It’s almost like fate had made Yuuri its plaything once again.

Well, maybe Yuuri is panicking without reason. Maybe the man wouldn’t remember, or maybe he would have the decency to take that encounter with him to the grave.

His eyes are bright as he advances into Yuuri’s office. “Are you…? It’s you, isn’t it? From Casa Roja two nights ago?”

Or not. Yuuri resists to urge to groan his frustration, struggling to keep his own scent from demanding acquiescence. It wouldn’t be fair to start off this...working relationship...with so great a disadvantage for the party he’s supposed to be helping. Yuuri could still deny it. It’s not like he’d even known the name of the bar he had stumbled into—he hadn't cared. All Yuuri had wanted was a reprieve from his life, something new and different to distract him from the weight dangling like an anvil over his head.

He had gotten more than he had bargained for that night.

With each passing second that Yuuri remains trapped in silence, his deniable plausibility shrinks, until his new patient lands the death blow: “It is you. Holy shit.”

But the truth is, a small part of Yuuri that he hadn’t yet burned away had still clung to hope. He had let his alpha run rampant that night, an ill-advised action he rarely put on display. The omega he had collided with had not put up protest, so Yuuri had decided to gamble with himself. He would give up. He would do his utmost to cast that omega from his thoughts. But if they were by chance to find each other again, Yuuri would not let that omega go.

Fuck, the man still smells as good as he did that night. It lingers about his body, carelessly drifting, seeping into the crevasses between bookshelves and paintings. Yuuri might as well be signing his own death certificate.

Yuuri straightens his posture, just enough to assert a boundary in his space. “I’m going to ask you to to please step back and take a seat, Mister– ah, that is, Detective–”

Shit. How were you supposed to address someone when 48 hours had yet to pass since your hands were down that someone’s pants?

“Nikiforov,” the man quickly replies. Yuuri had been _prepared_ —he should have _known_ that. “No, Victor. I changed my mind. Call me Victor,” he amends with a shake of his head.

And Yuuri had known _that_ , too, but he had chosen to ignore it. It’s always easier to release, the less personal something is. Sudden heat spreads across his cheeks, but Yuuri barrels onwards.

“If you insist, Victor. Please, have a seat,” he welcomes as he settles behind his desk. Yuuri may be an alpha, but his clinic is no place for such hierarchies. He clears his throat, hoping to steer this appointment back on course. How had he permitted it to derail so quickly? This wasn’t like him. “I trust that you know why you’re here?”

“I think so. The universe finally decided to smile in my direction for once, and led me back to you when I thought I’d lost you forever,” Victor answers affably—almost _flirtatiously_. The wince is automatic, but before Yuuri can say anything to dissuade Victor’s line of logic, Victor continues. “Seriously. You just left me there, stranded out in the cold all of a sudden,” he accuses with an edge of indignation, “You didn’t even give me your name!”

“Victor, please.” Any shred of control Yuuri had hoped to maintain slips through his tightly-laced fingers.

The man pauses in his assault, his mouth snapping shut. He eyes Yuuri critically, as though _he_ were the alpha sizing up a fellow predator. Or who knows, maybe he considered Yuuri prey. “You were never going to, were you?”

What burns the most is that the words are not an allegation, just crystallized disappointment.Yuuri chews at the inside of his mouth and firmly keeps his hands together, lest he reveal the tiny crescents carved onto their backs. He has never weathered being a disappointment well, even when he does not owe the opposing party a thing.

Barely missing a beat, Victor laughs. It’s surprising and bright, shifts the color of his scent to something like pastel. “It’s okay. I’m not judging you or anything.” He leans forward, an easy smile gracing his lips. “God knows I’m the last person in this city who’d be able to judge anyone.”

And that. _That’s_ what finally riles Yuuri, crawling underneath his skin, because the last thing his needs is judgment, and it certainly _feels_ like it. “Does my earlier conduct at that establishment raise any concerns for you?” he says coolly, tipping his head back a little to look down the line of his nose at Victor. “That is…with regard to my competence as a medical professional, and as someone who can help you.”

The bewildered look on Victor’s face is almost worth enduring the farce this appointment started off as. “What?” Victor squawks, mouth falling open in disbelief, “You want us…you want us to continue this?” His scent dulls instantly, almost retreating into itself.

Who was the predator now, little omega?

“If you have no reservations about it, then of course,” Yuuri continues amiably. The next thing to come out of his mouth awakens a fierce possessive flash. “Though I am technically under Mr. Feltsman’s employ, I’d be remiss if I didn’t consider the possibility that our earlier…encounter, shall we say…might have colored your perception of me. I would be happy to refer you to Dr. Leroy if you are not comfortable receiving treatment from me.” The _idea_ of handing his omega over to that imbecile, allowing him access inside Victor’s mind, sets Yuuri’s blood on fire. But it’s a necessary evil; Yuuri is willing to bet that Victor will not take the bait.

Victor’s scent sours as it descends into distress. He closes off his body completely, and the action absurdly picks at Yuuri’s pride. “But it is a bit awkward, isn’t it?”

“Why? It doesn’t have to be.” Yuuri straightens his glasses, hiding behind the Doctor. If he can just project the confidence he does not feel, maybe he can bluff his way to a win.

Victor looks lost as he perches in the seat across from him, coat hanging by the door. He is surrounded by two conflicting scents: the one Yuuri desires and one that displeases him greatly.

Neither Yuuri nor his alpha enjoy Victor’s anxiety. His alpha screams inwardly, struggling to claw its way out and clamber over the desk to close the distance between their chairs. More than that, if Yuuri can’t persuade Victor to feel comfortable here… It would make Yuuri’s life significantly more difficult.

He takes out his notebook and assumes an air of authority, letting his alpha bleed in. “I’d like to start by having you tell me a little bit about yourself. Anything you’re comfortable sharing. We can go from there, see where that takes us.”

 

* * *

 

Noticing the placard beside one of the doors on his way down, Yuuri can’t resist peeking through the window into Victor’s office. It’s dark and unoccupied; Yuuri can’t make many details out other than a desk and pair of chairs, overstuffed cardboard record boxes lined up against the walls, and stacks of papers piled messily over the surface of the desk. There’s a curious cluster of notes, photos, and pinned twine on the far wall, resembling an intricate pass of cat’s cradle.

“Can I help you, Doctor?” a voice to his left calls.

Yuuri internally curses himself at being caught while his guard is down and nearly jumps out of his skin. That’s twice that Victor has been able to surprise him like this; Yuuri hadn’t even noticed his scent.

Their unintended meeting does not go over well. Victor shoves past him, and Yuuri hastily makes his way out of the building, foretelling an altercation and harboring zero desire to be present for it. But Victor catches up to him, his scent positively acrid and rolling off in angry waves. Yuuri wonders if this is it, if fate once more has decided to toy with him: show him a glimpse of what he cannot have and keep slapping him in the face with it.

But as he had warned the night they’d met, Yuuri eviscerates Victor with his tongue, this time by words he knows will cut deep, and Victor offers his second act of submission.

 

* * *

 

Less than a week later, Yuuri finds himself yet again sitting across from the man whose agency bears his name. Yakov Feltsman is a respected man in the city, gruff at first glance but soft where it matters, but also soft in a way that could easily lead to his undoing. He agrees easily to turning over more of Victor’s history, eager to fix whatever has broken inside his employee, and they make arrangements for the boxes of paperwork to be transferred later after the holiday.

“I’m entrusting Vitya to you,” the older alpha tells him as he firmly grips Yuuri’s hand.

Yuuri nods and gathers his things. Closing the door behind him, he feels a funny sense of déjà vu as he arrives toe to toe with Victor once again.

Unlike the previous time, Victor seems to be in a prime mood. After exchanging greetings, he teases Yuuri, blocking his path so that they enter an awkward sort of dance upon the stairway. Yuuri cannot fathom what Victor intends by this display of immaturity—does he mean to unsettle Yuuri, mentally or physically? Or does he think this is humiliating for Yuuri in some fashion?

“You’re not going to push me down those stairs, are you?” Yuuri jokes after disclosing the purpose of his visit. Given their last encounter, Yuuri would not put the urge past the other man. Victor’s mood has not dampened, but he turns momentarily pensive, his light scent twisting like the current underneath ocean waves.

“Do you have any plans for New Year’s Eve?” And really, he shouldn’t be surprised: Victor has a way of leaving Yuuri grasping at the straws of his own meager expectations.

He hasn’t thought about it, and he says as much. Perhaps go back to the office to pass time, or avoid his responsibilities altogether and spend the rest of the night alone at home as the clock ticks away. He has...other expectations to meet—which over the passing years feel more and more like _obligations_ —but if Victor is providing an out…

Well, maybe the universe isn’t being as unkind to him as Yuuri initially thought. What’s one last day of selfishness before everything resets?

_Should old acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind?_

And really, no matter his resolve, Yuuri knows he would never be able to resist the wide, inviting smile that Victor gives him, nor the warm, sugary smell that blocks his path. “Want to spend the rest of 1928 with me?”

 

* * *

 

_”Can we just...pretend you’re not my therapist until the year is out?”_

Victor has no real plans, so they wander the West Side, ending up by the docks of Hell’s Kitchen. They sample the food cart offerings and make small talk, Victor more open than he had been during their first therapy session. They are still learning to communicate, latching onto each other even as they careen over the bumps and steep slopes of their differing experiences and personalities. A sudden downpour has them racing for cover, taking refuge under the first awning they find.

A random play is as good as any way to pass the time, and Yuuri is amused by the random way in which Victor seems to affect his life. He’s freezing, his suit jacket soaked, but there’s not much Yuuri can do about it now. Yuuri pays for their tickets despite Victor’s protests and promises to reimburse, which is...odd. Novel. People, when they see him, are usually so quick to accept Yuuri’s gifts and favors. They see an alpha clothed in restrained opulence, strong and backed by formidable resources, and hasten to bow for his blessings. Victor either chooses to ignore all this or simply does not consider them at all.

 _A date_ , huh.

Ever the gentleman, Victor offers his coat when he notices Yuuri trembling with cold beside him. Yuuri reluctantly tugs the garment on, his unease at accepting kindness giving way to the warmth of being enveloped in that intoxicating scent. It’s a role reversal for sure, but Yuuri find he does not mind. Moreover, the gnawing desire to do the same to Victor—to see the man in something of his—grows overwhelming, and Yuuri all but forces his scarf on his date. He can’t be blamed for a little _quid pro quo_.

The play is nothing remarkable, but at least the box seats afford them a modicum of privacy. They chat lowly throughout the first act, critiquing and making fun of the inane storyline and tired cast of characters. Victor seems to be enjoying himself, though, so Yuuri writes it as a win. Even Victor’s aborted attempts at seduction, so hesitant and fragile, are endearing.

He won’t be satisfied with a mere kiss to his knuckles, though. Better to take the proverbial bull by the horns.

“I said, you weren’t listening,” Yuuri whispers as he abruptly climbs onto Victor’s lap, letting his alpha take charge under the darkness of the play’s cover. Why dedicate time to murderers and criminals when that’s all that surrounds him, when he can breathe in the clean air of this omega and all the promises he wants to offer? Yuuri cups Victor’s face with his hands and crashes his lips against Victor’s, sighing into the fulfillment they bring and how they open in invitation. Victor tastes differently, cheap street food meeting cheap coffee, but even without the alcohol, the kisses burn in an exquisite manner.

Yuuri very nearly growls when Victor holds him by his hips and pulls him forward, pressing them flush together. The broad expanse of Victor’s chest is warm underneath his button-down, firm in a pleasing way. _Other_ things are becoming firm in another pleasing way, and Yuuri grins devilishly as he bites down into the plushness of Victor’s bottom lip. They roll their hips together, Victor enthusiastically thrusting upward to meet Yuuri’s downward grinding, and Yuuri marvels at how their bodies seem to slot against each other like they were made to fit. He wonders how it would feel to be inside Victor, to make him moan and sing out his body’s pleasure without interruptions. How much more responsive to his touches Victor would be during the throes of a heat, begging for Yuuri to fill him.

It’s frankly ridiculous how they can’t seem to control themselves in public, and yes, Yuuri is mostly to blame for that, but he can’t bring himself to care even a smidgen at their impropriety. It’s crazy, and so unlike him. How has this man, whom he hasn’t known for a week, managed to carve into Yuuri so intimately and rip out everything he’s hopelessly attempted to cage? How can he hold such power? Yuuri grows increasingly grateful with each passing second for their box seats: there’s no way other patrons do not notice they way they must be stinking up their wing of the venue, but at least the exact source of that scandal would be harder to pinpoint.

But the way their scents mingle—how Victor’s sweetens in his presence while his own deepens almost as if to cradle it—is intensely gratifying.

The first time, Yuuri hadn’t been able to mark, the shadows across Victor’s neck an impediment to his hunger. But he allows himself that now, a tiny claim, sanctioned by Victor’s gasped assent. Yuuri latches onto Victor’s neck and sucks right above the gland, his nose so full of Victor’s heady arousal. He runs his tongue over the bruised flesh, his mark stark against Victor’s pale skin, parting with a reverent kiss as the theater is curtained in black and the lights interrupt.

And if maybe he had an ulterior motive to convince Victor to accept his scarf? Well, who could blame Yuuri, with the detective looking the way he did, hair still damp from the rain and mussed, lips dark against flushed cheeks. He winds it around Victor’s neck, letting his adoration and a hint of smugness show, a second layer of ownership to swaddle the physical mark.

The play concludes with little else fanfare or excitement, but their hands stay intertwined through the remaining acts. Even if the actor on stage had pointed his gun to Yuuri’s heart, Yuuri would not have been able to remove his smile.

 

* * *

 

At Yuuri’s insistence, they make a stop at a store that sells men’s outerwear. Yuuri drags Victor into the shop by hand, but Victor’s protests are only half-hearted, as though he had already resigned himself to his fate. Winding his way through displays of peacoats and long trenches, Yuuri passes hanger after hanger into Victor’s reluctantly waiting arms, finding admittedly more amusement at this turn of events than he properly should. Turning a slight embarrassment into a silver lining—Yuuri has found he could be quite good at that. His merriment almost completely carries him away, until the niggling of the reality he had pushed aside comes back to finally bite him, and he checks his watch.

Just a bit of business to attend to. Then he could return to the last hour of this fantasy, consequences be damned. _Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t_ went the saying, so he might as well do as he wishes, just for this one night.

When Yuuri returns, the picture awaiting him casts any lingering doubts away. The coat is perfect despite being off the rack: it fits Victor well, just tight enough across his shoulders, and his alpha preens at the sight of his omega wearing something Yuuri selected. Something he provided. If Victor would let him, Yuuri would fill his entire wardrobe with the finest bespoke suits, carefully chosen to accentuate Victor’s long legs, the graceful slanting of his neck, the bright blue of his eyes and the moonlight of his hair.

Clad in his new cobalt blue coat, Victor strolls alongside Yuuri into the bustling noise of Times Square. Yuuri resists the urge to loop his arm through Victor’s, to parade this pretty omega around as his own. It’s only been a week since they first crossed paths, but Yuuri finds himself fantasizing more and more of what would have happened had he simply taken what he had wanted that night, which Victor had neither offered nor denied. Would Victor have resented him? Did Victor harbor a desire to be claimed? Would his secondary gender have overridden any protests or quandaries about how two strangers would make an irreversible bond work?

Lost within his thoughts, Yuuri is surprised to discover that time has passed so quickly: only ten minutes remain in this little alternate existence where they are not patient and therapist, and Yuuri is only Yuuri Katsuki, a first-generation transplant from Seattle, one of millions in this city. They shuffle through the thick pedestrian traffic, closing in with other New Yorkers who have decided to brave the cold for their city’s annual tradition.

Victor stands next to him, his vision alight with the Times Square Ball. His gaze is trained on it so earnestly, the bulbs that make up the Ball a shining reflection in his eyes, he almost looks like a child. “Yuuri?” he calls, somehow still soft despite the need to yell and full of painful wonder.

“Yes?”

The smile Victor gives him could easily rival the glory of any fireworks display. “This was a lot of fun.”

Something turns in Yuuri, stinging and bittersweet. Memories of racing down empty streets and stories told by candlelight surge past the barriers set up in his mind, sweeping them aside. Yuuri shifts closer to Victor, their arms connecting. Even through two layers of thick wool, Yuuri can feel the warmth emanating from the other man. And just like that first time, even amidst a sea of people, Yuuri can clearly distinguish Victor’s unique scent, calling to him like an oasis in an arid desert.

When had Yuuri started to seek it out as a comfort?

Yuuri swallows around the ache lodged in his throat. “It really was, wasn’t it?” he replies, certain of the truth of it, the first certainty Yuuri has had in a while. “Thank you for inviting me.”

He puts away thoughts of _tradition_ and _extinction_ and _distance_ , choosing to focus on the distance between himself and the man standing beside him. It is far too great, this close to midnight. If the stroke of twelve were enough to break an enchantment, then perhaps could a kiss keep it intact? Would it grant his wish?

Five seconds to test that theory. Yuuri reaches up and pulls off his glasses, pinching the bridge of them between his fingers. He blinks at the new blurriness of his surroundings and turns to Victor, calling his name.

Victor turns to him, and it’s now or never. Yuuri looks up at Victor, splaying a hand flat against his chest. He’s stunning. Yuuri will never be able to find someone else like him. Taking a split second to smooth over the fine fabric of his own scarf, Yuuri takes hold of it and pulls.

The world erupts in cheers of revelers, the blaring of a band playing a worn-out tune, and a dazzling combustion of color. Yuuri’s heartbeat drowns out all the noise. Still, the man in front of him is the only thing Yuuri desires.

The joining of their lips is tender, a far cry from that of their first parting. Rather than goodbye, Yuuri presses his lips against Victor’s and imparts the dawning of a possibility as they head into the new year.

_If you will go, I will follow._

He inhales before he lets go, enjoying the spike of sweetness against the earthiness of his own, as if their scents had planned a fireworks show of their own. The smile that finds itself upon his face feels foreign, but Yuuri welcomes it. He can’t remember the last time his spirit has felt so light, his heart so full. It’s like everything is right with the world, even when it’s not. If he were to distill his own scent now and bottle it up, Yuuri is sure it would shine golden.

“I’ll see you this Wednesday,” he says, wrapping Victor’s coat closer around him before he loses Victor in the crowds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year! <3


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time is a curious phenomenon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 6 January 2019. For Orchids, who wanted some hort~

Time is a curious phenomenon.

His body gives more of a fight than Victor had expected it to. It jerks and spasms against his will, his lungs exploding like the paper bags kids play with by punching the air out of them. He has long given up on the struggle, conceding to the inevitable, his hands heavy and useless at his sides. Even if he tried to command them now, Victor is positive they would not move. 

If someone were to ask Victor, he would swear to the devil himself that he was not suicidal. No sir, no ma’am, he did not wish to end his life, but. If something were to happen to him, well...Victor would just consider it as his number finally being called. 

And it looks like the grim reaper has finally come knocking. Victor has heard the accounts of one’s life flashing before their eyes as they die, replaying the entirety of a person’s childhood, victories, and defeats like a faded cinema reel within a matter of moments. He could rather do without that, but he isn’t sure the alternative is better, which seems to be a steaming heap of guilt to the soundtrack of the last song he heard cheerily blasting out of Emil’s office.

_I wanna be loved by you, just you!_

He does not deserve the ease of death, not after the destruction through which he had condemned 121 souls. All of them gone, some within a blink of an eye, some enduring an agony of stretched-out minutes as their flesh seared from their bones or their lungs burned and boiled from the inside. And still, the countless surviving family members, whose grief would be etched into the remainder of their days upon this planet, their lives forever altered by missing bedtime stories, the absence of warm embraces, vacant seats at suppertime. Whose bereavement he could never heal or expedite through handwritten letters, which did nothing to absolve his sins and served as little more than formalities, even though Victor tore his heart to shreds to use as paper in the process.

Victor knows there is no point in regret. You can’t turn back the clock, no matter how desperate or the price you would pay. Life is a bitch, and then you die. It’s as simple as that. You are granted a finite amount of days, and if you fuck them up, that’s on you. His only regret would be leaving Makkachin, but even if no one bore any love for Victor, perhaps they would have the humanity to spare his baby from a life on the streets.

No, Victor does not deserve the ease of death, but it does not seem he has much of a choice. At the bare minimum, he can say he _tried_ to fend his attacker off. Surprised from behind, his gun had been useless, but Victor had managed to rake up and down the man’s arms, tilling angry welts. There are bound to be bits of skin and blood underneath his fingertips, even cut as short as they are. He put up a fight, but it was not enough, but maybe his effort would be deemed satisfactory?

_And nobody else but you!_

Victor wonders who would bother to show up to his funeral. Gosha had been seen off by so many, their love pouring in tearful streams that were washed into the dirt. Even heaven had cried for him. But for Victor? Victor would not get the same treatment, that’s to be sure. Yakov, perhaps Yura...maybe the rest of the agency, if they were to be generous with their time. Otabek, probably—he always liked the kid, and if Victor only ever did one good thing in his life, then sparing the rookie cop from Victor’s curse would be it. He still had a future, maybe could still save this city, or at least the part of it that wants to be saved. News of Victor’s death would certainly spread along the tendrils connecting the city’s underbelly, and maybe Lilia would find it in her heart to attend, even if she stood at the sidelines and watched him be lowered into the ground from a distance. Maybe his funeral would be well-attended—by those who wished to piss and spit upon his grave. 

And Mama. How would she know? Would she finally return for him, after he is already gone?

_I wanna be loved by you, alone!_

What would his obituary say? _Disgraced ex-cop finally bites it, to the elation of the rest of his old colleagues_? _Mafia slut meets his maker after 31 years of playing a menace to society_? Victor’s good ol’ friend Lionel Church would be sure to have an _absolute field day_ penning some scathing and vengeful column, probably something about justice finally being served.

Huh. His right foot is oddly cold. And wet. Did he lose a shoe in the scuffle? Victor remembers kicking out, attempting to buck his assailant off him with no real luck. The man was heavy, his actions practiced. He knew how to take a person down while keeping their struggling at a minimum. Absurdly, Victor flexes his foot, amazed that it still responds, comically grossed out that his sock soaked by whatever filth a New York City puddle harbors will be logged as evidence in a crime scene. And that’s _only_ if he is fortunate and the Kips Bay Strangler decides to beat feet rather than dump his corpse in the East River.

Even death refuses to grant him a sliver of decency.

_Christ_ , did dying really take this long? Victor feels like he’s been stuck under his murderer for an eternity, already. Maybe he is already in hell, and hell includes a looping selection of Emil’s godforsaken choice radio station.

_Boop-boop-a-doop!_

Firecrackers set off down the street. Were people celebrating his death already? Victor finds that he can’t really blame them, whoever they were.

The pressure around his neck slackens, replaced by a crushing weight slumped against his chest. Something hot and damp collects underneath his left arm. Air burbles in his mouth and stutters, rank and dingy, tasting of brine. His vision is a series of ink blots bleeding together, and he can barely peek through the negative spaces.

_Don’t die. For the love of God, please don’t die._

That’s...not how the song goes. The voice is wrong but familiar, rougher than he has heard in a long time, but something Victor _knows_. Why can’t he place it? Who is calling for him, asking him to do what he cannot?

He feels his head rolling around on his neck like a newborn’s, a sharp tapping against his cheek that does not really register. His mind has disconnected from his body, functions going out of service. _Ring-ring! We’re sorry, Victor Nikiforov’s pain receptors are not available right now, and they aren’t taking any messages. Click!_

As darkness overtakes him, Victor feels his lips quirk up of their own will. Even in death, he is a disappointment.

He lets go and surrenders to the greatest kindness he has ever known.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ["I Wanna Be Loved by You"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hclK-UKJNgk) as performed by Helen Kane (1928).


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s a thought that keeps him awake at night: he could do it. He has an out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 18 January 2019.

It’s a thought that keeps him awake at night: he could do it. He has an out.

Victor could take this place, finish fixing it up, then take the proceeds and run. It wouldn’t take much longer; they are already finished with the bulk of the necessary repairs, and most of it was cosmetic, anyway. That had been Yuuri’s original plan for this place, had it not?

_“But when I bought this place, I remember myself thinking that this was it. This was your ticket out of here.”_

He could take Makkachin and leave the madness of the city behind, disappear to someplace far away and start anew. Yuuri had mentioned London—an old, small dream ripe for resurrection. Scotland Yard would no longer be on the table, but… Maybe his old suspicions would be right, and he would find Mama there. Maybe he would drift from country to country, never to stay long in one spot. Why lay down roots when your entire life had been cemented to one place, threatening to become your grave? 

The Mafia would eventually forget about him, right? It’s not like Victor was exactly beholden to the case, objectively speaking… Apprehending Karpisek’s killer bore no weight to him, so what did it mean to him to see it through?

_“Cash out and leave.”_

A scarlet arc splashing across a familiar doorway like a benediction. A too-white sheet spread over a too-dark puddle. The corpse of someone he had once called a friend, his dead eyes staring up into Victor’s own in a silent plea. Christophe had been the slaughtered lamb for his own abode, and the plague festering within this city had greeted Casa Roja instead of passing over it.

And then blood on the sidewalk, the familiar copper scent suffocating as a body went down before him with a sickening crunch. Weeks upon weeks of sitting around and waiting, helpless, fearing the day would come where he would have to write his 122nd letter.

And. A young boy who reminds Victor far too much of himself for comfort.

_“I would leave in a heartbeat if I could.”_

_If._ Even if Victor wanted to drop everything and run away...Yuuri would not. Not until his debts had been paid, whatever that meant. Yuuri had once said he did not trust this city to leave Victor alone...but could Victor live with himself if he abandoned Yuuri to this merciless jungle? It was a two-way street—Yuuri didn’t get to worry about him if Victor wasn’t allowed the same affordance.

_“A gift. Would that really be so bad?”_

Yuuri still sleeps soundly next to him in this bed that has become their own, his hair soft and undone upon his pillow, bare shoulders peeking out from the safety of the blankets. They had picked out this bed set together, paging through catalogs and wandering up and down department store aisles. They both have stopped packing overnight bags, instead leaving bits of themselves behind to recollect on the weekends. Sometimes Victor wonders about keeping this gift. The life they have here...it isn’t bad. 

But they are still too close to the siren that calls their names and pulls them in.

Perhaps Mama had known better, after all.

_“We’ll leave together.”_

Is it really that easy? Could they do it? Or would it be smarter for Victor to cut his losses now, and maybe...maybe Yuuri would find him after? The more and more Victor thinks about it, everything starts to feel like a bad ending. There are too many players in this game, too many unknowns, and Victor is one hand away from going all-in on this gamble. All or nothing. Too many times, Victor feels the empty chasm that awaits his next move, ready to swallow him whole.

_“In order to mitigate the possible damage in a certain area of your life, you may have to content yourself with relinquishing some other part of it that you would have wanted to hold on to.”_

Nothing was ever that easy, and if it was...it always came at a price.

_“Would you wait for me?”_

The truth is, he would do whatever Yuuri asked of him. Yuuri has made his request. And so dreams of escape, of leaving one shore behind for the next... That is all they will ever be: dreams.

Yuuri stirs beside him. Victor has noticed he does this thing just before he wakes, where his face scrunches up and he pulls the covers over himself tighter before he finally cracks open his eyes. He always squints in disapproval, as though the mere thought of the morning offends him, and then rolls over to smile at Victor, as if he is some reward for his troubles. 

“Hi,” Yuuri says, the covers still tucked up across the bottom half of his face. Victor can’t see the smile directly, but Yuuri’s eyes are shining gold with dawn’s early glow, and his brow is relaxed.

It’s infectious, and Victor can never help the smile that spreads across his own lips in return. “Hey,” he says, reaching over to play with the fringe that has fallen over Yuuri’s forehead. Yuuri leans into the touch, shaking the covers from his chin. Victor bends to meet him, pressing their lips together gently. For all of Yuuri’s fire and passion, it is times like these that Victor cherishes: the quiet hours before life begins to tick away, where they are only Victor and Yuuri, and everything feels warm and right, and nothing hurts.

“Ready to get to work?” Victor murmurs softly, tracing the seam of Yuuri’s lips. Yuuri groans, and Victor laughs, because of all his wildest dreams, this is all he has ever wanted.

Yuuri sits up, his hair in utter disarray. He inhales sharply and blinks, then flops heavily onto Victor’s chest. “Can’t make me,” he mutters, and Victor laughs at that, too, because this is also part of the Yuuri he loves so much.

“You’re right,” he soothes, petting Yuuri’s hair flat. “But I can make you breakfast, and coffee, and maybe that’s enough to entice you out of bed.”

Yuuri presses into him harder, chasing a nibbling on his clavicle with a lick. Victor bats him away with a knowing smirk. “None of that. That’s _definitely_ not gonna help you to get up.”

“There are other things I can get up,” Yuuri grumbles, and Victor resists playfully smacking him with a pillow. As much as he would _love_ to give in, Makkachin needs to be walked, and they need to get the base coat of paint done in the kitchen today so that they can finish it tomorrow.

Victor gives Yuuri a quick peck on the lips then attacks his cheeks and forehead, until Yuuri is squirming and giggling at his onslaught. “Okay, fine!” he says, wrapping his arms around Victor’s neck. His face is flushed and his eyes are bright, and he is so, so beautiful. He closes his eyes and leans up for a proper kiss, and Victor can’t help but indulge him. 

Yuuri may be granting him an out, but...it’s this life, here, that Victor wants to keep.

“Later,” Victor promises.


	20. Chapter 20

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s a deceptively innocent reminder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 4 February 2019. Omegaverse AU^AU, part 3.

It’s a deceptively innocent reminder. Victor’s coat drapes over the back of the armchair in Yuuri’s bedroom, as a visual cue to take it with him when he leaves. He has gotten it professionally cleaned so that the coffee stain would not set in, but even after that procedure, the garment still smells like Victor. It’s like his scent has permeated into the very fibers of the fabric and become part of the coat itself. It must be well-used and well-loved for it to carry his scent so. It’s a bit threadbare in some parts and ragged along the seams and buttonholes, worn after countless times of dressing and undressing, stretching across Victor’s broad shoulders and pulled tight over his chest. More than once, the crazy thought of scenting the coat before it returns to its owner passes through Yuuri’s thoughts and hangs around like a silent judge. It taunts him even now, as Yuuri stares across the room at it, resting there like it belongs. Would Victor appreciate such a gesture, or would it be too forward, a violation of their personal and professional relationships?

He laughs to himself at that thought: personal relationship? Do a few kisses and getting handsy over a span of a handful of days count for that much? Does Victor even think of him as much as Yuuri does of Victor?

Sometimes Yuuri finds himself sitting in that chair, nestled against Victor’s coat, as though it’s Victor’s chest that his back is pressed against while he reads or writes his daily journal entry before bed retiring to his empty bed. It would be nice to have the real thing in his bedroom one day, to sit on Victor’s lap on that very chair, or to do less innocent things atop his bed.

Yuuri rubs the fabric between his fingertips and brings the edge of a sleeve to his nose. He inhales deeply, letting the scent collect in his lungs.

It smells like Victor. It could smell like _them_. 

For now, he contents himself with the memory of the coat he had gifted the omega, so deep a blue that it brought out even the blue of Victor’s veins, hiding under the moonlight of Victor’s skin.

He’ll return it the next time.

 

* * *

 

Another week passes before they see each other again. Sitting across from his patient, a different coat hung upon the rack, Yuuri curses inwardly. 

He tells himself that the sinking feeling in his stomach at not seeing the new coat hanging there is merely a tiny disappointment. Does Victor not like the gift? Does he find it too embarrassing to use? Was he acting polite when he accepted it, and never intends for it to leave the secrecy of his closet?

With a mental shake of his head, Yuuri dispels those distracting thoughts, urging his alpha brain to calm the fuck down. Here, within these four walls, he has a role to play, and that role does not involve _that_ aspect of himself.

Well, there’s always _next_ next time, Yuuri assures himself. With their current arrangement, they are scheduled to see each other once a week, at the very minimum. Plenty of opportunity to exchange borrowed goods and for that coat to make an appearance, although Yuuri wouldn’t mind at all if his scarf found its way into Victor’s active wardrobe. For Victor to adopt it as his own, a part of Yuuri to linger with him from the moment he wakes to the moment he returns to the warmth of his residence.

Victor reclines before him on the daybed, his long legs falling over its edge. He clutches a cushion over his stomach, his gaze trained at the ceiling. Beside them, the fireplace roars, blocking out the winter chill and mercifully dulling his patient’s enticing scent. Yuuri watches as Victor fidgets and gets his bearings at this new arrangement. He fiddles at the cushion’s corner and rubs over the swell of its stuffing, and a vision of Victor reclining, his belly swollen with Yuuri’s child, flashes vividly in Yuuri’s mind. His alpha stretches and curls in contentment.

Yuuri crosses his legs and adjusts his notebook. “I’d like you to tell me about your day.”

Victor’s hands still, folding atop the cushion. His wrists are placed just so that his scent glands lie close to the seams. By the end of their session, it will have certainly encapsulated the omega’s scent. 

“Is that really going to be all that useful to you, Doc? My day was pretty boring.”

On the contrary—Yuuri wants to know everything about this man. What makes him tick, the lynchpin to undo him, how to seduce him so that he’ll only ever want to look at Yuuri for the remainder of his days.

“Where you say ‘boring,’ others might say ‘quiet.’ To others still, something like that would be a relief, perhaps. It’s important to have a frame of reference for everything we observe,” he says instead.

Victor hums, objecting again. When he finally looks at Yuuri, Yuuri smiles at him, his lips pressed into a thin line. If Victor thinks he can run from this, he has another thing coming. _“I always catch them in the end.”_ Yuuri could say the same.

“Humor me, Detective.”

Yuuri takes notes as Victor speaks, happy to listen to the man’s rich baritone. Really, it sounds like liquid gold, and Yuuri would give his entire fortune to listen to it all day. As it is, he is _being_ paid to listen to it for an hour once a week. Despite his patient’s rather reticent behavior, Yuuri believes he has gotten the better end of the deal. 

Victor runs Yuuri through his early mornings, his ever-present pup, and his work at the agency. When he talks about one colleague in particular, his voice lightens and his strained expression turns soft.

“Does he remind you much of yourself, when you were his age?”

His patient laughs at that, and although it’s a bit derisive, it’s the finest music to Yuuri’s ears. “Not even a little bit.”

Yuuri’s pages fill with more notes. _Attachment to younger colleague. Perhaps a revisionist fantasy?_ “I see.” 

Victor shifts as he continues to describe his day, angling his body so that it opens more to Yuuri. Victor’s neck is a long, sinuous line that flows underneath his loosened collar, down into the turn of his waist before rising over the curve of his hips. The economy of his clothing does nothing to obscure his beauty. Shadows cast by the flickering flames dance over Victor’s throat, concealing the vestiges of old injuries and calling Yuuri’s attention like a siren coaxing him to his undoing. If Yuuri focuses, he can see the bruise he laid there, cocooned against silver hair and cheap cotton. He wants to close his mouth over it again, lay claim to the gland tucked just below Victor’s ear.

He wants to bite.

Yuuri grits his teeth and fires his first shot. “Is that the lie you fed Mr. Plisetsky to placate him?”

“Excuse me?” Victor chokes out, his face falling abruptly.

Discarding his notebook and pen onto the side table, Yuuri leans back in his chair and assesses Victor over the bridge of his glasses. If Victor refuses to be truthful with himself, then it is Yuuri’s duty to push him along. “Victor, I’m going to ask you a question that you will likely be tempted to skirt. For the sake of us moving forward in our work here, I’d appreciate an honest answer.”

Victor nods, but there is a challenge in his eyes and within his words.

“What made you decide that you no longer wanted to be a cop?”

And just like that, Victor stills as though he’s been physically shot. He swallows visibly, but his voice does not waver. If Yuuri could smell it over the burning logs, he is certain Victor’s scent must have retreated into itself. “Before I answer that, this didn’t come from Yakov, did it?”

Always so distrustful, this one. Although the files he was given do not detail Victor’s entire history, Yuuri wonders just what happened to break Victor’s faith so irreparably. “It came from you, actually.”

Objectively and professionally, Yuuri knows his patient is probably not properly equipped enough to handle this conversation so early into his treatment. But Yuuri is still learning the man, and just how far he can stretch Victor before the man recoils, snapping them both.

“I think that’s a good note to end on for tonight,” Yuuri announces after concluding that Victor isn’t about to concede anything of use. He starts to get up but pauses after noticing the lost look Victor wears. Cradling Victor’s cheek in his palm, Yuuri says, “Thank you for being forthcoming with me, Victor. I know it wasn’t easy.” They’re placating words, but they seem to be what Victor needs at the moment, as the man closes his eyes and leans into Yuuri’s touch. Yuuri’s alpha surges a little at that, such a subtle submission. An admission, too: there must be something about Yuuri that Victor’s omega deems as comforting and dependable.

He could be such a good provider. He could.

“Have you got my business card on you?” Yuuri murmurs, and when Victor’s eyes flutter open as he nods, Yuuri asks, “May I see it, please?”

They have to break apart for Victor to retrieve it, and Yuuri regrets the loss. But he turns the card over in his hands and writes across its back before he can second-guess himself at what a costly mistake this could end up being.

“This is my home number. If you ever need anything, or if you want to talk—any time of day, if you can’t get a hold of me here at the clinic—I hope you’ll call that number.”

There is a hint of a smile playing at the corner of Victor’s lips. “Is this allowed?”

Strictly speaking, no. If any of his colleagues were here, they would have discouraged it with strong words. _You’re getting too close. It’s dangerous to blur these boundaries when you’ve been granted access into someone’s psyche._

But. None of them are here.

“It depends on who you ask. Perhaps you already know this, but the field I’m practicing in is still very much in its early stages, especially on this side of the Atlantic.” Yuuri chuckles. It’s not exactly a lie.

“So you’re winging it,” Victor deadpans, unimpressed.

Ever the detective, able to extrapolate the things left unsaid. Yuuri’s smile lingers, “Or, to put it more positively: there are lines that are sketched in sand, for now. I’m willing to be a bit flexible…if only you’ll meet me halfway.” And he wants Victor to come closer, to let Yuuri in. They could be so good together.

It must be the wrong thing to say, as the ease in Victor’s body depletes and the barriers reinstate themselves. “Thank you, Doc,” he says as he stands and shrugs on his coat. The smile that he gives Yuuri is false, a mockery of the gift Victor had bestowed upon him on New Year’s Eve. “May I go?”

The fire crackles as a log disintegrates into glowing embers. “Have a good night, Victor.”

 

* * *

 

Victor bursts through the door in a blur of motion, quickly striding over to Yuuri’s desk after discarding his winter jacket. “Sorry I’m late,” he blurts, strangely keyed-up, “Where do you want me today, Doc?”

_Anywhere. Everywhere. Moaning my name while writhing on top of my knot_ , Yuuri’s mind supplies. God, he feels like a teenager who just presented.

Truth be told, Yuuri has been looking forward to their meeting all week. He had missed spending time with Victor, which should have been impossible: they have not known each other long enough for Yuuri to miss the other man. Yet between appointments, Yuuri had found himself lying on that daybed, holding onto the cushion Victor had held, imagining it was the omega draped over him. But now that the object of his desires is here, something feels… Off.

Victor’s eyes flit about the office, zipping between the decorations and out the window, then back to his lap—landing anywhere but on Yuuri. Yuuri takes a deep breath to center himself, readying to reassure Victor through the use of his training and not his pheromones, and that’s when it hits him.

The sweet, pleasant smell Yuuri had been growing so accustomed to is gone. In its place is...nothing.

Victor doesn’t smell like anything.

_Why?_

From what Yuuri could tell, Victor does not bother with suppressants... So why would he feel the need to douse himself with scent neutralizers so thoroughly that nothing of himself remained?

“Wherever you want to sit,” Yuuri says, straightening his back as Victor slumps into the seat before his desk. He observes Victor coolly, staring at the man’s face far longer than what is considered proper. He decides to start with the obvious. “You look exhausted, Victor.”

And it’s the truth. Every inch of Victor’s body is riddled by a dearth of energy. His eyes, sometimes so bright, are lackluster and steeped in defeat. Dark bags carve all the way down to the tops of his cheekbones.

“It was a long day,” Victor sighs.

Dodging, then. “Do you want to walk me through it?”

Victor picks up the tail of his tie and begins flipping the point back and forth over his fingers. “Not much to tell. Paperwork, it doesn’t end… I might as well have been chained to my desk.”

The phrasing puts… _interesting_ thoughts into Yuuri’s head. He tamps them down, opening his notebook to jot down a few observations as a distraction. When he looks up, Victor’s attention finally falls upon Yuuri, although he still refuses to meet Yuuri’s gaze. There’s something else in his eyes now, perhaps a...longing, if Yuuri were to put it into words, but perhaps that is his own hope projecting. “For the case you’re working on, yes?

“Yeah.”

Yuuri permits them to continue this song and dance for a few more minutes: Victor clearly avoiding the issue, Yuuri attempting to coax the truth from him. They have just started to begin their therapy sessions, and Victor is already a difficult client to begin with, so Yuuri knows he cannot expect the automatic level of trust his other patients grant him. But today, Victor is even _more_ difficult to pin down—it’s like he simultaneously wants and doesn’t want to be here, and that desire’s cancellation has led him to clam up in avoidance.

It’s Yuuri’s turn to sigh. Since a gentle approach is leading nowhere fast, it’s time to prod a bit more directly. “Let’s try that again, only this time, you don’t lie to me: what happened within the past seven days that’s been taking up all of the space in your mind ever since?”

The possessive, basic part of Yuuri’s brain wants the answer to be him. But Victor is far too worn-out, like a man who has grown tired from digging his own grave, for that hope.

To Yuuri’s horror, Victor looks like he’s about to cry. “I might have had an...encounter,” he begins, every word laced with reluctance, “that I regret.”

Oh. Yuuri schools his expression before instinct makes him properly react. “In what way do you regret it?” 

Victor’s jaw tenses. He chews at the inside of his cheek and looks down. When he speaks, his words are carefully selected, as though the confession costs something he cannot pay. “I wish it hadn’t happened. I can’t turn back time, though, so I wish I could just forget about it.”

Yuuri doesn’t want this to be what he thinks it is.

“That’s unfortunate,” he remarks. His pen feels heavy in his hand as he drags it across the pages. Words, he needs to find words to process this, as much as Victor does. The distance spread out between them is a field of landmines, and Yuuri must tread very cautiously, lest one explodes in both of their faces. “I suppose if you could turn back time, with the knowledge you have now, you would take care to avoid the encounter altogether?”

It isn’t like they had any sort of agreement or understanding between them. They hadn’t _talked_ about what their seemingly-mutual attraction meant, or what, if anything, they intended to do about it. Victor is free to do what he wanted, with whomever he wanted. It isn’t Yuuri’s business.

But he wants it to be.

The strength of his jealousy is surprising and overwhelming. There is a real possibility that if Yuuri were to open his mouth right now, a growl would escape. His alpha snarls at the mere _idea_ of someone else touching the omega it has deemed as _his_. Someone certainly unworthy, someone who clearly did not appreciate the value of the treasure they had taken. Something Yuuri himself has not had the privilege to experience.

A sharp laugh throws Yuuri off-kilter. “There was no avoiding this.” There is no mirth in Victor’s tone, just a soulless quality that frightens Yuuri to his bones.

This. He is familiar with this.

Victor is staring right at him. His eyes say everything: a plea for Yuuri not to connect the pieces he’s laying out before him. “And besides, it’s over now, so it doesn’t really matter either way,” Victor tacks on. He closes with a half-smile that contorts the beauty of his face. “What can you do, right?”

This is an answer Yuuri knows. And it is: nothing. There is no benefit in hanging onto regrets of the past; they cannot be changed. All one can do is move forward, as best as they can. But when the situation at hand strips one’s sense of self...one’s own worth… It’s enough to paralyze.

There is fire within his blood. It screams as it courses through his heart and seeks to destroy.

“Victor,” Yuuri says, so gently it hurts to speak, “were you forced?”

“No.”

The rejection is automatic. It’s expected. Yuuri wishes it weren’t so.

“I can’t tell if you’re trying to convince me, or yourself.”

Victor stumbles through his response, and there’s nothing more that Yuuri wants to do than to hold him, to stroke his hair and kiss Victor’s forehead. Tell him it wasn’t his fault, that he in no way deserved such treatment. But none of that will help Victor now. “I was the one who went to him. I _knew_ … I knew what was going to happen once I walked in there.”

“Because you wanted to?” Yuuri isn’t sure which answer would be the more merciful.

“He didn’t have a gun to my head. I could have stopped it at any time. I could have walked away.” The force of Victor’s trauma races through his body visibly, leaving it trembling in its wake. He shivers violently, as though struck with hypothermia despite the warmth radiating from the fireplace. For a brief, guilt-stricken moment, Yuuri is grateful that Victor is currently devoid of a scent—he is sure the intensity of Victor’s fear and torment would debilitate him. The alpha in Yuuri hungers to scent his omega, to swath Victor in his own scent and compel his body to submit and calm itself.

But doing so would not be much different from what _that man _did to Victor. And despite his avoidance, Victor needs to _confront _these emotions before they eat him alive.____

_____ _

Yuuri leans forward, crowding into Victor’s space. “Without suffering any repercussions for having done so, I’m sure. Or am I wrong?”

____

It’s a misstep. Victor freezes, and Yuuri can see the faulty walls surrounding Victor begin to reconstruct themselves. “I… I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

____

It’s enough for the day. Yuuri tosses his notebook aside and laces his fingers together. “It’s important to be honest with yourself, Victor. You need to acknowledge where the line is drawn between events that are the consequences of your own actions, and injustices committed to you through no fault of your own.”

____

Victor bursts into laughter again, high and near-hysterical. It’s a sound Yuuri never wants to hear again. “Pretty sure this was my fault,” he mutters lowly, but audible enough for Yuuri to still catch.

____

“Then enlighten me."

____

“You’d have to clear out the rest of your night."

____

“And what if I did? Would you talk to me then?” Yuuri challenges, calling Victor’s bluff.

____

There’s a pause, as Victor actually considers. Yuuri briefly wonders if the honeyed scent, so light in the air, is merely his memory at work.

____

“I only want to help you, Victor. You know this, right? But you’ve built walls upon walls around yourself, shutting everyone out. Even those who only wish you well.”

____

Victor remains silent. His eyes narrow, assessing. If anything, he seems _less_ trusting of Yuuri than before. What had he said that Victor took so wrongly?

____

“I wish you would let me in,” he says, offering a truth. “In the same manner that you seem to trust so easily with your body, I wish you would trust me with your mind.”

____

Shock sweeps across Victor’s face: Yuuri can see the bloodshot white surrounding the blue of Victor’s eyes, they’ve gone so wide; his mouth drops open before he snaps it shut into a severe frown. His hands, fisted upon his lap, rise to clutch over his chest, as if to staunch the blood loss from a phantom injury. Victor gapes at Yuuri, blinking rapidly, his breaths shallow.

____

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

____

Oh shit oh shit _oh shit_. Time for damage control, stat. “Nothing. I take it back.”

____

“That…that was really fucking unprofessional.” The words are spit like venom. It’s entirely merited: a doctor had essentially accused his patient of being a slut.

____

“It was,” Yuuri hastily agrees, praying that his plea of remorse would be enough of a balm for the burn and to maintain control over a disaster of his own making. “And I apologize. I should not have said that.” What the _fuck_ had be been thinking? That was the problem, though. He hadn’t been thinking. It had simply slipped out, too much truth that should never have been brought to light.

____

Victor looks at him—truly _looks_ at him for the first time that day, his eyes searching for something. Yuuri is quite frankly surprised that Victor still sits before him; most threatened omegas, by this point, would have fled. Their fight or flight instincts tend toward flight. Yuuri’s not sure whether what is transpiring now is a testament to Victor’s inner strength or stubbornness.

____

Whatever Victor is seeking, it appears Yuuri is lacking. “You’re only sorry that you said it out loud.”

____

It doesn’t matter Yuuri’s intent, and Yuuri isn’t certain what the truth might be anymore. All that matters is that he has hurt Victor, the damage cutting deep. Victor had come to him for help, had actually shown up to their appointment despite the defilement he had suffered, only for Yuuri to throw the abuse back into his face and rub salt into his wounds.

____

“Victor, that’s not true–” the words rip like glass shards through his throat.

____

Victor kicks back the chair as he abruptly stands, the blue of his eyes darkened into a turbulent storm. He shakes as the onslaught of his emotions overtakes him, struggling in his urgent attempt to pull his coat back on. “No. You know what? I’m done,” he announces, his voice clear even as his body betrays him, “Tell Yakov whatever you want. I’m ending this.” He turns his back on Yuuri and strides towards the door.

____

_“I’m ending this.”_ It rattles in his mind, each word dropping like lead in his stomach.

__

“If you leave like this, I’ll have no choice but to give Mr. Feltsman my real recommendation,” Yuuri says, grasping at any reason for Victor to stay. He knows it’s playing dirty, but he will take any opening to salvage this mess he has made, no matter how desperate. “You know what that means.”

__

Whirling around, Victor hurls his fury like thunderbolts. “Fine, do your worst!” he cries, baring his teeth. “What’s Yakov going to do, bench me? Fire me?” He laughs then, taking a step back into the room, rounding on Yuuri. “Anything is better than having to sit here, week after week, while you dig into my head and pull out all of these things that I don’t even want to _think_ about, forcing me to relive them again and again and again and—for what? To watch me suffer? Does… does that amuse you?”

__

Yuuri feels his heart splinter as Victor’s voice falters. Victor continues on his tirade, Yuuri too stunned into shamed silence to object further. “You can’t _fix_ me. You don’t even know what the hell you’re doing!”

__

And maybe it’s yet another wrong move, because Victor’s face buckles, his anger receding like the tide, leaving the undertow to pull him into a sea of agony. Victor turns on his heel, his knuckles white around the doorknob.

__

“Victor, please–”

__

“Goodbye, Dr. Katsuki. I’m sorry for wasting your time.”

__

>Too many wrong steps, and now Yuuri has set off the landmine.

__

The door slams shut.

__

 

__

* * *

__

 

__

_“Crazy”_ seems to be a word tossed about in Yuuri’s conscious mind with alarming frequency lately. He’s never acted so boldly before, nor as recklessly. His life up until this point has been a pattern of measured control. It had to be. And it still is, but one particular omega seems intent on destroying that hard-won balance, whether the man is aware of it or not.

__

But there is no other word to describe his actions at the moment. Yuuri did not acquaint himself often with the Lower East Side, unless he had business in Williamsburg or by skirting the region to take the Manhattan Bridge home. He sticks out like a sore thumb against the grit of the neighborhood, obviously misplaced and ripe for targeting. Yuuri pulls up to the tenement building and places his car in park, the surrounding windows like sets of eyes trained upon him.

__

He shakes the unease off. He is an alpha. There is power in his name.

__

But none of that power prepares Yuuri for what faces him. The building is fairly new yet already in a state of disrepair, as hardened as the community it houses. There are cracks and gouges in the brick, errant lines of graffiti along the ground-level residences. The lowermost fire escape hangs precariously and bobs when the wind picks up, the metallic screeching harsh on Yuuri’s ears. Laundry hangs like flags off balconies and on lines strung across buildings. Yuuri switches off the engine and sits within the heat of his car, feeling utterly lost for the second time that day.

__

He had made it this far. He might as well not waste the trip.

__

The cold hits him as he steps outside and locks his car, pocketing the keys. Yuuri pulls his collar up closer around his neck and, after a moment’s hesitation, makes a beeline toward the front door. Confidence, he reminds himself. If he _acts_ like he belongs here, then maybe less people will notice how out of place he is. Yuuri grasps the handle of the iron storm door and tugs, grateful and appalled that it gives way so easily—there is no security to the building, no lock to keep intruders like himself at bay.

__

Once safely inside, Yuuri takes mental notes of the entrance. There is no directory, just a wall of nameless mail slots, as well as a side staircase that grants access to the upper levels and a hallway that presumably leads to the bottom apartments. It’s dim, the lights in the hallway halfway burnt out. Yuuri takes the stairs two at a time after the first step creaks loudly underneath his foot. He grasps the banister a little too tightly and feels its give, and his hand quickly releases the wood before it has a chance to fall right off the wall. He stumbles a few times, the point of his shoes catching on uneven planks and nails that were hammered at incorrect angles.

__

Before long, Yuuri arrives at the top floor. The building is quiet—disconcertingly so. It’s as though all of its occupants have silenced themselves to eavesdrop on his trespassing. Yuuri is thankful that he only has to walk a few paces from the landing to find the number belonging to Victor.

__

The door is old, the hinges weathered, the brass plating on the knob chipped. Yuuri breathes in a sigh of relief that there’s at least a deadbolt, but from the looks of it, the rotted frame could easily give way with a few insistent kicks. His stomach twists, bile catching at the back of his throat. In such a dwelling...with such conditions...Victor isn’t protected. Yuuri always knew the man didn’t have much in the way of personal wealth, but. Knowing and seeing are two vastly different experiences. Victor doesn’t deserve to live in a place such as this. And the worst of it: Yuuri possesses the means to improve at least this aspect of Victor’s life, and he _wants_ to, but he knows he doesn’t have the authority or right to do so.

__

Yuuri counts the minutes in his head as they tick by, anxiety welling in his gut. At any moment, someone could see him. The chances that his car, flashy and expensive, catches attention grow by the second. Hell, Victor himself could burst through the door, sickened or enraged by Yuuri’s unwelcomed presence.

__

He keeps his scent tucked close to him, despite his instincts to flood Victor’s apartment with sedative pheromones. Victor must not know he’s here. It’s already such a foolish gamble to _be_ here, lurking outside his abode like some stalker alpha.

__

His knuckles never reach the door. They pause in midair, mere inches from their destination. Yuuri freezes each time his arm attempts to complete the motion, the signals from his brain never quite connecting as they should.

__

Why is this so hard?

__

Yuuri had fucked up before, but. Maybe never quite like this. It hadn’t _mattered_ quite like this. Even when he’d faced utter disappointment, when he had paid bodily for his mistakes and failures after... None of them compared to the hurt he had imposed on–

__

On someone who mattered to him.

__

God, he can still clearly picture the crestfallen look on Victor’s face. The devastation, quickly followed by a flash of anger, red-hot and burning. Yuuri had felt scorched by that look.

__

He needed to make things right.

__

If Victor wished to discontinue their therapy sessions, well. That would be his choice, and Yuuri wouldn’t argue. He would make up some story for Mr. Feltsman, then pass along a referral and remove himself from Victor’s life. It would be a heavy loss for him, sure. But Yuuri would survive. He had suffered worse losses before, and while he would’ve wanted to discover where life would take him and the omega...ultimately he only had himself to blame for the fallout.

__

But maybe. Maybe this wasn’t the way to do it.

__

If he presses against the door carefully, Yuuri can detect the faint edges of the omega’s scent just beyond the threshold. It’s bitter and so heavy with anguish it’s suffocating and so _wrong_. And just beyond that, if he closes his eyes and closes out the rest of the world, he can hear it—faint, but clear, tugging keenly at his heart—a quiet sobbing. The kind that racks the entire body, that permeates and consumes. Yuuri’s known it more times than he cares to admit.

__

He wants to rush inside, to gather the damn courage of his name and fucking knock already, to hold Victor close to him. Beg for forgiveness—press his forehead to the floor, if he must—to soothe the other’s sadness and pain. Yuuri might not exactly be the root of Victor’s troubles, but he had aggravated them all the same, full-well knowing the precarious balance that keeps Victor afloat.

__

_First, do not harm_. Right. He couldn’t even do his fucking _job_ right, it seemed. the most important promise, and he had already broken it, despite his intent. If there is one thing Yuuri prides himself on, it is that he is not in the business of breaking promises.

He’s such a fucking liar.

Breathes pass through him hollowly as Yuuri idles outside Victor’s door in silence. He’s not guarding it. But when had he dropped to his knees? Or pressed his palms flat against the surface of the cold wood? The cries from inside have not stilled or abated—they are a continuous stream that Yuuri’s entire being is attuned to.

He loses track of time, not bothering to check his watch. He sits sentinel by the door in misery, replaying their last confrontation over and over, until finally the apartment is dark and quiet, and Yuuri drags himself back down to his fancy car and his fancy home across the bridge, alone.

Sleep does not come to claim him until dawn reaches up beyond the horizon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That scene at the end? That was a delicious morsel Orchids fed to me; I just seasoned it lol XD


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They had run as far as they could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 11 March 2019. **TW for murder-suicide.**

They had run as far as they could. And in the end, they always ended up here.

Yuuri sits beside him on the damp sand, their hands linked in the small space between. Victor does not know how much time has passed, only that they had dragged themselves, battered and bruised, here, cloaked under the safety of night. Neither had made motion to go inside the house they had once shared: they had bypassed it altogether—a relic from another age—arms slung over the other as they had shuffled toward the beach somewhere in the twilight hours. And neither had said anything after they had both collapsed at the shore, instead sitting in silence, just holding onto one another as they stared into the dark of the waters.

“We really had a good go at it, huh?” Yuuri says, his eyes downcast as his fingers play upon Victor’s, tapping and sliding over them as though he were making music.

“We did, didn’t we.”

Yuuri looks wistfully out to the sea. The light of dawn illuminates him softly, reflecting off his glasses in shades of pink. “Do you remember,” he asks, toying with the metal band around Victor’s finger, “when we talked about what comes after everything?”

Victor nods, a choking in his chest. He’s not ready for this.

“I still mean it.” Yuuri turns to him, his smile impossibly fragile. “I would always choose you. In this life, or the next, or any of the ones to come after.”

“And if we never met?” Victor asks, because he knows the universe is rarely so kind, and if this life has taught him anything, it was that clinging to expectations only leads to disappointment.

“I know I would always find you.” Yuuri looks at him so intently, as though he were staring right through Victor and speaking as one soul to another.

“How can you be so certain?”

“I’m not, but. If I wasn’t, then what else would I have to believe in?”

And if there’s anything Victor would believe in, it would be Yuuri. Even now, at the world’s end and all their dreams shattered below them, Victor still holds onto Yuuri’s words to him as truths carved in absolutes. Because even when he didn’t, Yuuri had a way. Even if Victor couldn’t trust in what Yuuri said to him, he could trust in the conviction behind the words. He swallows around the lump in his throat. “I love you, you know.”

Yuuri’s lips curl upward. He clutches at Victor’s hand desperately, scattering sand. It reminds Victor of the hourglass he had accidentally knocked over as a child. He had been so upset, but Mama had swept the broken shards and grains up and bandaged his cuts without even a reprimand. 

They’re out of time.

“Even now?” Yuuri whispers. The words are almost swallowed up by the crashing waves.

“And always. Forever.”

A laugh. It’s not the laugh Victor loves to hear. “I’m glad.”

They slip into a comfortable silence. The waves lap at the tips of their shoes, but never quite reach far enough to kiss them.

A light breeze plays through Yuuri’s hair. “They’ll be here any moment, now,” he murmurs like he’s been lost in thought.

Victor brings Yuuri’s hand up and kisses his knuckles. “Yes.” And really, they both have been living on borrowed time for so long. He could say it’s unfair, but they don’t have a right, really, to be upset. They were able to make it this far, together, and that should be enough. It’s more than they could have dared to expect. At the end, they weren’t able to escape, but at least it won’t be the city that takes them.

“Can I ask a selfish favor?”

“Anything,” Victor promises, because he has never, ever been able to deny Yuuri anything. 

Yuuri’s eyes shimmer with unshed tears. Sometimes, Victor wishes Yuuri didn’t try to be so strong for him. At the least, he should be free to cry now, of all times. “Can I go first? I don’t want to live in a world where you don’t exist.”

It’s Victor’s turn to laugh. “Yet you’d leave me alone?” he says, lighter than he feels.

Yuuri turns his hand in Victor’s and laces their fingers again. The sun has risen over the ocean, its light glinting off Yuuri’s glasses almost blindingly. “Together. I’ll wait. You’ll only be a breath after.”

Victor inhales and holds the air in his lungs. It’s damp and tastes of brine and everything he keeps unsaid inside. “Okay.”

Their hands part. Victor takes up his gun and dusts the sand off. Yuuri reclaims his—his mother’s, which Victor had gifted to Yuuri what feels like a lifetime ago. Victor never expected it to be pointing at him. They raise their arms and stare down the barrels.

A strange part of Victor feels like he should apologize. But he would never be sorry for meeting Yuuri, has never regretted a moment, even after everything. God, Yuuri is still the most beautiful thing Victor has ever laid eyes upon or has had the privilege to touch.

They gaze at each other, Yuuri’s expression unbearably fond, and Victor should feel scared. His heart should be racing. He should get up and run far from this place. But instead, his heart feels as heavy as his body, and whatever’s waiting for him past this bullet will surely be better than anything this life afforded him.

“Until we meet again.” Yuuri’s finger squeezes on the trigger. A loud bang resounds from Victor’s. Yuuri crumples backwards, soundless. 

He had never completed the shot.

Victor stares at Yuuri’s body for a long while, at the thin line of red that the waves come to collect. He stares at his gun and turns it around in his hands, places it back in the sand, and gently removes the revolver from Yuuri’s. The grip is still warm from where Yuuri had held it. Victor places it to his temple and pulls after a second’s hesitation, but all that comes is an empty click.

That’s what does it, then. The tears fall, hot and overwhelming, a dam broken beyond repair.

He’s gone.

Behind him, the sound of footfalls crunch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I'm sorry. It hurt to write this;;; Next chapter will have an alternate ending.)
> 
> Fun fact!: This drop-kicked me in the head one night right before I went to sleep. I looped The Lumineers' cover of "Walls" while writing this.


	22. Chapter 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Until we meet again.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 13 March 2019. An alternate (happy?) ending/coda for the previous ficlet!

“Until we meet again.”

Two shots crack like a whiplash, sending the watchful seagulls aflight. The bodies fall into each other in a final embrace, their faces as peaceful as sleep though devoid of spirit. And the city reclaims them, as it always does, but their names bypass the headlines into quiet obituaries. They leave together as promised, and history forgets the disgraced detective and the foolish doctor who had dared to defy fate.

Decades later, long after the world had gone to war a second time, they are reborn in lands they had only dreamed of calling home ages ago. Victor Nikiforov’s birth is hailed by long labor and a snowstorm in St. Petersburg, a vast 6835 kilometers from Long Island. 1436 days later, Yuuri screams out his first breaths as Toshiya and Hiroko Katsuki’s second child in Hasetsu, true to his wish of never living in a world where Victor did not exist.

They do not meet as children, although Yuuri’s childhood is indelibly shaped by Victor’s existence. They do not meet as adults in a back alley bar, nor do they share a heated first embrace in a small and dark telephone booth. True to his promise, although he will forget in an intoxicated haze, Yuuri finds Victor, and Victor will hold onto that memory—and in this way, Yuuri will indelibly alter Victor’s path. They fall in love again slowly, during the blossoming of spring into the warmth of summer and the fading light of fall, and instead of running from their demons in isolation, they face them head-on, together.

In this life, there is no need for dreaming or wishes, for all their wants are answered in the other, and fate has blessed them as the architects of their own fortune. If one day, the city calls them back—just for a fleeting visit—they will wonder how a new land could feel so familiar, how their feet seem to know where to take them, how certain roads and buildings can bring an ache to their chests. But when they leave, it will feel like parting with neither friend nor foe, but perhaps as children flying from the nest for good.

And this time, history will remember them. For their courage and bravery, talent and achievements.

And, most of all: for the strength of their love.


	23. Chapter 23

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Let’s head into the city,” Yuuri proposes, his eyes strangely bright, which is the first clue to Victor that the other man has something hiding up his sleeve.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the go-ahead to post some previously Discord-only fics, so happy White Day!
> 
> 21 October 2018.

“Let’s head into the city,” Yuuri proposes, his eyes strangely bright, which is the first clue to Victor that the other man has something hiding up his sleeve.

Victor quirks an eyebrow, holding his steaming mug of coffee halfway to his mouth. “On Christmas Day? Won’t it be a nightmare?” Victor counters. Throngs of people flocking for holiday delights, the streets muddied by a slurry of snow, dirt, and car exhaust. Having once lived there, Victor has since come to appreciate living on the outskirts of town. Less eyes, less pressure. Fewer unwanted memories to avoid.

“I have something planned for us,” Yuuri says, the tip of his tongue darting out between his teeth. It’s one of Yuuri’s tells—something Victor picked up on after years of being together—and while the detective in Victor wants to pry Yuuri open and glean all his answers, the larger part of Victor just wants to see his husband happy.

“Okay then,” Victor easily agrees, raising Yuuri’s knuckles to leave a kiss upon the gold band, “I will follow your lead.”

 

* * *

 

“I thought it’d be romantic,” Yuuri says as he skates lazily around the newly-opened Rockefeller Center skating pond. He is a vision in his winter white coat, the cold kissing his cheeks with a rosy pink.

“It _is_ romantic,” Victor half-lies as he nearly trips over an errant bead of ice. Even with the new skates ( _“I won’t stand for rentals on those feet,” Yuuri had tsked with a measurable amount of disdain_ ), Victor isn’t as smooth a skater as Yuuri is, who’d had the motion carved into his muscles as a child. He refuses to cling to the perimeter, however—he’s not a _child_ , and his dignity can stand a few stumbles if it means he can skate alongside Yuuri.

It’s more people gathered in the Sunken Plaza than Victor’s ever seen, families and couples sliding around with laughter or leaning against the metal railing and taking in the merriment. The rink sparkles underneath the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree, resplendent with garland and shining floating orbs. Despite the crowds, it feels intimate in a way, gliding in repetitive orbits, Yuuri occasionally breaking off to do fancy-looking crossovers but always circling back to Victor’s side.

Yuuri skates a little ahead and turns to face Victor, taking both of his hands in his, pulling Victor forwards as he skates backwards. Victor is grateful for the stability—he feels safe in Yuuri’s hands, and he’ll take any excuse to shamelessly hold hands with his husband, especially in public. “Can you believe,” Yuuri says, “it’s been eight years since we first met?”

Victor smiles, the memory as clear as yesterday. It had been a particularly bad day, to put it lightly—the start of a new multitude of bad days, if he were to be honest—but their chance meeting at Casa Roja was something Victor could never regret. In the end, they had found each other and made it through. “You did tell me once that eights are lucky,” Victor replies, giving a small squeeze.

“They are,” Yuuri agrees.

“It’s bronze this year, right?”

Yuuri nods, the lights glinting like stars off his glasses. “Or pottery. I’m not too fond of bronze. What do you think? Shall I buy you a new coffee mug to replace that chipped one?

“I like that mug.”

“I could get you a nicer one.”

“It does its job.”

Yuuri wrinkles his nose, and Victor laughs. “Then perhaps a new china set.”

“We already have one,” Victor points out, rewarding him with another withering look.

“You never let me spoil you,” Yuuri very nearly pouts.

Victor laughs and pushes aside the urge to pull his husband in close and kiss the top of his head. “Darling, you spoil me enough. There’s nothing more I could ask for than having you to myself for life.”

They slow to a stop, a rock in the river of traffic parting the flow. Yuuri stares intently at him, hands sliding to grasp at Victor’s elbows. The holiday lights reflect off his eyes, making them glow like vivid pools of amber. “Happy birthday,” Yuuri says, stroking the long lines of the scarf trailing down Victor’s chest as he leans in for a kiss. Victor leans forward, their lips meeting midway. It’s so very different from their first kiss, yet no less wanted or special. Somehow with time, it’s only gotten sweeter, the taste of Yuuri’s mouth richer, like fine cognac that’s been reserved for aging. Victor knows that it’ll only get better— _they’ll_ continue to get better. They have nothing before them but limitless possibility.

When they part, Yuuri’s face is impossibly softer. “I’m getting cold,” he says, voice gentle like a secret. “What say you to a drink at the cafe to warm up? Maybe a hot toddy?”

Victor has other ideas for how he could warm Yuuri up, but he can save them for later tonight. He’s a patient man.

“Lead the way, my love.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Incidentally, this ficlet is historically accurate: the skating rink at Rockefeller opened on Christmas day, 1936, a fortuitous 8 years after Victor and Yuuri first meet ♥


	24. Chapter 24

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day after Victor met Dr. Yuuri Katsuki, he receives a postcard in the mail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 28 October 2018.

The day after Victor met Dr. Yuuri Katsuki, he receives a postcard in the mail. _It was a pleasure meeting you,_ it reads, penned in curling black-blue fountain ink. There is no return address or signature to claim the card, just a stamp over the postage that bears a New York imprint. The back is generic and seasonal, something easily picked up from a corner store. Victor tosses it onto the corner of his desk and thinks nothing of it.

The day after Victor kissed Yuuri (and knew his name this time), he receives another postcard in the mail. _Best wishes for the new year,_ it reads, a small smudge dragging the ink from the letters. The back depicts fireworks, vivid against a black sky and the outline of skyscrapers. Victor sets it atop the previous postcard, picture-side up.

The day after Chris died, another postcard arrives. _I am sorry for your loss._ Short, simple. Victor doesn’t know whether the words feel empty, or if he is to blame, the place where his feelings were contained carved out and left hollow. Chris had been one of the few people in this godforsaken city who’d given a damn about him. Illustrated white lilies, artfully arranged in a vase, adorn the back of the card. Victor crumples the card in his fist and holds a match to the corner before he douses the flames in the sink. The ink bleeds.

The day after Yuuri bought him a house, Victor receives a card bearing, _Please forgive me._ The ink is blotchy and the paper had bubbled, as though water had been dripped onto it. The back is a watercolor painting he had seen at the Met once: a bright seaside villa in Greece, shaded in whispy strokes of blues and purples. Gosha had dragged him to the last day of the exhibit, wanting to see the infamous _Portrait of Madame X_ in person. And then his life had irreparably changed. Victor stares at the writing for a long time, turning the card in his hands. Wonders if the beach house in Long Island looks anything like this. He feels like crying.

And after their next therapy session, a simple _Thank you._

And once, not long after, _Run away with me._

Days collect into weeks, and the postcards continue to come. Victor piles them into neat little stacks, tying them together with cooking twine. When he and Makkachin finally leave their tiny run-down flat, the postcards come with them. He keeps them on a shelf over his desk; Yuuri blinks bewilderedly at them but makes no comment. Victor thinks he can detect the faintest sparkle of a smile in his eyes.

Each anniversary of their first meeting, Victor receives the same generic seasonal postcard as the first one. But the messages change as the years pass: _I’m so happy to have met you. Another year in which you hold my heart. I am glad that you were born. You are my everything._

And on the morning Yuuri surprises him with a ring, the postcard that Victor receives reads: _Let’s grow old together._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Georgi drags Victor to the (real life!) exhibition on Valentines Day 1926, because he’s a hopeless romantic like that lol. The painting that Victor remembered was _Corfu: Lights and Shadows_ , also by John Singer Sargent.


	25. Chapter 25

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He might as well have been a ghost, or a hallucination, or maybe a mirage materializing in front of a desperate man.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 30 October 2018. For twolittlehummingbirds.

He might as well have been a ghost, or a hallucination, or maybe a mirage materializing in front of a desperate man. Five years had passed since Victor had last seen that face, one that he could never forget. But he had never expected to emerge it at the edge of Washington Square Park, in the middle of a blustery winter afternoon.

They nearly run into each other, Victor attempting to light a cigarette mid-stride, the other man nose-deep in a stack of papers. Victor stops just short of a collision, then an awkward dance of trying to step out of the other’s way follows. It fails spectacularly. The subsequent apology dies in Victor’s throat, two fingers still perched atop his hat as he tips its brim.

“Hi,” the man greets, a little breathless.

Yuuri Katsuki is a little thinner than Victor remembers, but he appears healthy. He still looks like a dream stepped into reality, his tailored suit luxurious and dark, hair pushed back and out of his face. A faded scar cuts across his cheek from where a bullet had grazed it. Victor aches to touch it.

“Hi,” Victor replies, feeling his chest twist sharply. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”

Yuuri ducks his head, a small frown tugging his lips down. Victor still burns at the memory of those lips—soft, yielding, intoxicating. “You can’t still mean that.”

“I’ve always meant it.” The words escape unbidden. It’s almost cruel how easy it is to say, how true it still is, even all these years later.

“Victor, I–”

“Don’t.” Victor smiles, holding up a palm. “It’s okay. I’m...okay.”

Yuuri’s mouth snaps shut. He gazes up at Victor, like he wants to contest Victor’s words, but instead he gives a short nod. “Okay,” Yuuri says slowly. Victor knows the question in Yuuri’s eyes, notices how he ever so slightly bites at the corner of his lip.

_But are you happy?_

A bark breaks the tension. “Who’s this little guy?” Victor bends down to scratch the pup’s head. He’s a brown poodle with floppy ears, just like his Makkachin, only basketball-sized. The dog crouches forward as Victor pets him, then lets out an excited bark and spins about, his tail wagging fiercely.

A faint pink tints Yuuri’s cheeks, but he doesn’t look away. “His name is Vicchan.”

Victor looks up, searching Yuuri’s face. He doesn’t know what he wants to find there. “It’s cute.”

Yuuri clears his throat, the blush still lovely and inviting. “Do you...want to grab coffee? Maybe?” He’s never seen the good doctor so uncertain, so hesitant. It’s a bit strange, and somewhat unsettling, if Victor wanted to be honest with himself. The Yuuri he had grown to know had always appeared confident and certain, aloof at times, and could eviscerate a man with words alone. Victor wonders, a little heartbroken, if this Yuuri in front of him is somehow more real than he had ever been.

“Now?”

“S-sure? Or, later, if you’re busy– Oh god, I’m sorry, I’m taking up your time–”

_Take it_ , Victor wants to say, _Take all of it_. “I’m not busy,” he says instead. He lifts his wrist to check the time; he’d promised Mila he’d be back with a box of crullers later. He hadn’t promised exactly _when_ , though.

“Oh,” a sharp intake of breath. Yuuri looks stricken, like he hadn’t meant to say anything. It’s fine; Victor never intended to hide it. It’s the same golden watch Yuuri had given him, a lifetime ago.

Ah, to hell with it. He’s never been able to say no to the man in front of him, and that’s a fact that’s not likely to change any time soon. His fate has always been sealed since that night at the bar. Yuuri may have run away to Japan after everything had settled, but he’s _back_ and they’re _here_ now, so doesn’t that count for something?

Victor glances through to the other end of the park; Yuuri still hasn’t taken his eyes off him. “There’s a place that’s just started offering coffees across the way on Bleecker; it’s growing quite a reputation. I hear they roast their own beans. I’m sure it’ll have something according to your tastes,” Victor says with a knowing, easy grin. “What say you? We get out of this cold, catch up a bit?” He holds out a hand, low enough that should Yuuri refuse, it could seem like a normal gesture.

Yuuri stares at it. A New York minute comes and goes before he switches the leash in his grasp. Ever so gently, he slides his hand into Victor’s waiting one.

It feels like a homecoming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~prayer circle they’ll get a happy ending _sobbbbssss_~~


End file.
